NatHistCam is a project to study the natural history of Cambridge, based on an 8 km x 8 km square which is roughly centred on Mill Road Cemetery.   There are maps of the area here. Our aims are to:

• create a snapshot of the flora and fauna of Cambridge City and its immediate environs in a historical context; and
• increase public awareness of the diversity of plants, animals and fungi in the city.

Based on our field studies, we shall publish papers and probably two books.

In each monad (1 km square) of the selected 64 squares, we have been  recording the presence of flowering plants, ferns, mosses and liverworts as well as amphibians and reptiles, birds, insects and other invertebrates, and mammals.

Survey work

The main fieldwork phase of the NatHistCam project has now been completed and we are now analysing the data we have collected and beginning to start writing up.

See the January 2020 newsletter for a summary of what we have done over the past few years.

Our regular blogs report on the many interesting things that have been reported to us.

The book

We are now writing up the data for a book of 120,000 words. This will include sections on

• Physical and human setting, including geology and landscape, the development of the city and the various habitats within the study area

• Animals, including amphibians and reptiles, birds, invertebrates, mammals

• Plants and fungi , including cryptogams

• Sites and nature conservation

To contact us e-mail nathistcam@gmail.com .

Background to the project

A copy of the poster we exhibited at the Cambridge Natural History Society’s annual Conversazione in June 2016, when we launched the project, is here.