What is Stronger Shores?
The Stronger Shores project brings together leading academics, Wildlife Trusts and other nature conservation non-governmental organisations (NGOs) to improve understanding of the costs and benefits of kelp, seagrass and native oyster habitats concerning coastal erosion, flood risk, climate change, biodiversity management and wider benefits.
The Stronger Shores project is a collaboration at its best, with leading academics and Wildlife Trusts and other nature conservation non-governmental organisations (NGOs) innovating together.
The project will fill the evidence gap so that we have a better understanding of the costs and benefits of restoring kelp, seagrass and native oyster habitats. These habitats can reduce coastal erosion and flood risk, and also sequester carbon from the atmosphere, providing a nature-based solution for the climate and biodiversity crises. The project will provide a mechanism for incorporating these nature-based solutions into future coastline management strategies and work along our coasts.
What are we doing in Redcar and Cleveland/Hartlepool?
KS2 & KS3 STEM workshops
As part of the Stronger Shores program, we offer Free STEM workshops for Schools! These are curriculum-based and are around 50 minutes per session for both KS2 and KS3. See the information below!
ShoreSearch
North Sea Wildlife Trusts hold regular citizen science sessions – Shoresearches with survey techniques used by Shoresearch volunteers across the country. Volunteers are trained to identify and record the wildlife on shores across the UK. The data collected helps experts to monitor sea life and better understand the effects of pollution, climate change and invasive species. Shoresearch data has been key to designating many of our Marine Conservation Zones. Keep an eye out on our website for more info!
Engagement talks
We hold engagement talks for schools, universities, and groups of all interests. We deliver talks relating to all of the activities we do under the project.
Project partners and collaboration
Stronger Shores brings together the Durham, Northumberland and Tees Valley Wildlife Trusts, to deliver activities that will help communities understand the benefits of marine habitat restoration. These activities are linked to work by the partners on seagrass, kelp and oysters, and will be delivered by a Marine Engagement Officer hosted by Durham Wildlife Trust.
Hosted by South Tyneside Council, Stronger Shores stretches from the Northumberland/Scottish border down the North Sea coast to Skinningrove in Redcar and Cleveland.
It is one of the 25 pioneering projects funded by the Government’s Flood and Coastal Resilience Innovation Programme, which seeks to develop and test ground-breaking interventions to improve resilience to flood and coastal erosion risk
The Wildlife Trusts in the North East will be leading seagrass re-introduction trials. The trials use an innovative new modular system pioneered by other Wildlife Trusts operating along the North Sea coast.
The modules, loaded with seagrass seeds from the Wildlife Trusts’ seagrass nursery on the Humber, will be inserted into mud and sand habitats in the intertidal zone at select locations along the North East coast. The sites selected are areas where seagrass was previously recorded and has been lost, or where environmental conditions appear to now be conducive for seagrass introduction.
