What We Do

Our commitment to the health of Chichester Harbour’s natural environment, on land and offshore, means our work in funding projects and fielding volunteers is extremely wide-ranging. With the harbour area facing heightened challenges from human footprint and climate change, the projects we support have become increasingly demanding and ambitious in recent times.

Projects

Volunteer

Educate

Raise Funds

Recent initiatives that the Friends of Chichester Harbour has helped enable …

  • Securing a £182,300 grant in August 2021 from the Government’s Green Recovery Challenge Fund for the 18-month ‘Return of the Tern’ campaign. Spring 2022 then saw the launch of five new tern rafts to encourage nesting during the four-month breeding season (May-August). That autumn a shingle recharge of Stakes Island was undertaken to improve this tern habitat within the Itchenor channel in good time for the 2023 season. Watch video clip below,  or view the full video on Chichester Harbour Conservancy’s YouTube channel at youtu.be/99j5HEynTRo

  • Improving Chichester Harbour’s habitats for resident black headed gulls, oyster catchers and other breeding birds. Safeguarding the available resting, roosting and breeding spaces is essential for these precious colonies to return, and thrive, across the Harbour each spring.

  • Supporting research into the sources and nature of pollution. Micro plastics and fibreglass deposits, in particular, are increasingly a worrying issue, and of course faecal contamination.

  • Sponsoring four pump-out stations for local marinas as a Harbour-friendly resource for the boating community. These quick and simple-to-use, trolley-mounted units at marinas ensure that ‘black water’ from a boat’s heads (toilets) is not discharged directly into the sea.

  • Provided funding towards University of Brighton’s research into the prevalence and implications of microplastic contamination in the waters of Chichester Harbour. This undertaking followed the 2018 Chichester Harbour Microplastics Symposium convened by a specialist team of researchers from the University, Chichester Harbour Conservancy and the Friends of Chichester Harbour.

  • Friends’ volunteers operate the popular popular Harbour tours on board the Oyster Boat Terror, from May-September. Moored in Emsworth, this beautifully-restored 125 year-old wooden sailing boat also gives a nod to the local oyster industry of Victorian times.

  • Assigning a grant of £30,000 over three years (2022 – 2024) for Chichester Harbour Conservancy’s Education programme for all school children to benefit from discovering the wonder of the Harbour and to appreciate the wildlife that depends upon its wellbeing.

  • Assisting Chichester Harbour Conservancy’s rangers, our volunteers get stuck into any number of practical tasks for the upkeep of the coastline: clearing bramble, maintaining footpaths, fence replacing, beach clean-ups and the like.

  • Did You Know?

    October 2022’s shingle recharge of Stakes Island in the Itchenor channel required 500 tons of shingle to raise the bank to one metre above the current high spring tide height.