Celebrating 10 years of Garden Wildlife Health

Garden Wildlife Health (GWH) is a collaborative wildlife health surveillance project which aims to monitor the health of, and identify disease threats to, Great Britain’s garden wildlife.

The project is a partnership between the Zoological Society of London (ZSL), the British Trust for Ornithology (BTO), Froglife, and the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds (RSPB), and in 2024 will celebrate 10 years since its inception.

As a citizen science project, GWH relies on members of the public reporting observations of ill health or death in garden wildlife. In particular, reports of garden birds, hedgehogs, amphibians, and reptiles are sent to to our website (www.gardenwildlifehealth.org). Where possible, freshly dead carcasses can be submitted for post-mortem examination under veterinary instructions.

The information gained from these disease incident reports and post-mortem examinations, in combination with species abundance data (via the BTO’s Garden BirdWatch scheme), enables us to better understand the impact of infectious and non-infectious disease on individual animal as well as wildlife population health, and allows us to promote evidence-based advice for safeguarding human and animal health, and to help inform government and NGO decision making.

This event marked the 10-year anniversary of the Garden Wildlife Health project, and highlighted key findings from the last decade, including some of the multi-project collaborative research the project has been a part of, and discussed lessons learned and future focus areas.

Speakers from the four partner organisations presented their key work with a particular focus on the benefits of collaboration.

Speakers

• Dr Katharina Seilern-Moy, Wildlife Veterinarian and Postdoctoral Researcher, ZSL
• Dr Will Peach, Head of Conservation Science, RSPB
• Mike Toms, Head of Communications, British Trust for Ornithology
• Andrew Smart, Conservation and Science Manager, Froglife

This event was chaired by Dr Katharina Seilern-Moy, Wildlife Veterinarian and Postdoctoral Researcher, ZSL.

Download the agenda and abstracts

Attending this event

• This Science and Conservation Event is free to attend and booking a ticket is required so we can monitor event numbers. Please only register for a ticket if you are planning on attending. Register your place for free now.
• The event will feature talks from several speakers, followed by a Q&A discussion panel. It will run from 6-7:30pm, and guests will be admitted to the online meeting shortly before 6pm.
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