The Hampshire Hedge is an ambitious new initiative by countryside charity, CPRE Hampshire, to connect Hampshire’s two National Parks, the South Downs National Park and the New Forest National Park, with a nature recovery corridor of hedgerow.  

As part of the launch, the project has been selected as one of only 150 charities across the UK to take part in the Big Give Green Match Campaign. 

Any charity donations for The Hampshire Hedge from April 20-27 are matched by the Big Give and doubled. 

Hedgerows play an enormously important role in boosting biodiversity, capturing carbon, improving food production and enhancing our rural community. The countryside has lost over half of all hedgerows since 1945 and CPRE Hampshire believe it’s time to turn this around. 

The charity has already worked for several years on restoration of hedgerows across the Hampshire countryside, educating and working with local communities, schools, landowners and farmers.

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The Hampshire Hedge will wind its way through the central heart of Hampshire parishes and link woodlands, meadows, local nature reserves and Sites of Special Scientific Interest (SSSIs). It will start from Copythorne in the New Forest and finish at Compton, on the edge of the South Downs, near Winchester. 

Ellie Banks, hedgerow officer at CPRE Hampshire, said: “The Hampshire Hedge offers communities a great opportunity to work together to restore and plant hedges in their local areas. We provide training on the traditional crafts of hedgelaying and offer some great resources to help communities learn surveying and hedgerow management to achieve the full benefits of their rich offerings.” 

Boyd McCleary, vice chair of CPRE Hampshire, said: “We were certainly delighted to be selected to take part in the fund match campaign. As a charity, we rely on donations to be able to deliver on work for our local countryside and this means that any donations we receive from individuals, communities and local businesses, will be matched and doubled. The Hampshire Hedge is not just ambitious but it’s vital to our work in the Hampshire countryside. We would urge people to make their donations between April 20-27 so we can fully make use of the funding opportunity.” 

Donations can be made online by using the link on the CPRE Hampshire homepage, cprehampshire.org.uk.