RSPB Minsmere

Minsmere is a place in the English county of Suffolk. It is located on the North Sea coast around 3.5 miles (5.6 km) north of Leiston and 1.5 miles (2.4 km) south-east of Westleton within the Suffolk Coast and Heaths AONB. It is the site of the Minsmere RSPB reserve and the original site of Leiston Abbey.

Minsmere–Walberswick Heaths and Marshes are a Special Area of Conservation and Site of Special Scientific Interest in the English county of Suffolk. The site is located on the North Sea coast between Southwold and Sizewell, extending over an area of coastline around 7 miles (11 km) in length. The site is also designated as a Special Protection Area, part of the Minsmere–Walberswick European Marine Site and contains areas designated as Ramsar sites and Natura 2000 sites. It lies within the Suffolk Coast and Heaths Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty and is made up of a "complex mosaic" of marshes, reed beds, shingle banks and lowland heath habitats. The SSSI covers an area of 2,325.89 hectares (8.98 sq mi; 23.26 km2). It is a composite site and was formed by the almagamation of the Minsmere Level, Walberswick and Brick Kiln Walks SSSI units. It extends from Hen Reedbeds and Southwold Common north of the River Blyth, through Walberswick and Dunwich to Westleton, Minsmere and Eastbridge to the north of Sizewell nuclear power stations. The area includes the Suffolk Coast National Nature Reserve sites at Hen Reedbeds, Walberswick and Dingle Marshes, the National Trust property at Dunwich Heath and the Minsmere RSPB reserve. It is a Nature Conservation Review site, Grade I, and covers two nature reserves managed by the Suffolk Wildlife Trust, Dingle Marshes and Hen Reedbeds.

Minsmere River is a river in the English county of Suffolk which flows into the North Sea at Minsmere. The river is formed from the River Yox at Yoxford before flowing through Middleton, Eastbridge and Minsmere. It flows to the south of Minsmere RSPB reserve helping to form many of the wetland habitats at the reserve. The river valley was largely drained and used as agricultural land in the past. The original course of the river, the Minsmere Old River, runs to the north of the Minsmere New Cut, an artificial drainage channel built in 1812. This reaches the sea at Minsmere Sluice, a tidal sluice which discharges water from the channels into the sea.

Dunwich Heath is an area of coastal lowland heath just south of the village of Dunwich, in the Suffolk Coast and Heaths AONB, England. It is adjacent to the RSPB reserve at Minsmere. It lies within the area of the Minsmere-Walberswick Heaths and Marshes Site of Special Scientific Interest, Special Area of Conservation and Special Protection Area. It has been owned by the National Trust since 1968, when it was bought with the help of a donation from the Heinz company as part of Enterprise Neptune. Dunwich Heath is a rare survival of coastal lowland heath; the Suffolk Sandlings used to form a lot of the Suffolk coast, but have mostly been developed for agriculture or built upon. The heath is mostly covered with heather, both Common Heather and Bell Heather, and European and Western Gorse but there is also some woodland and grassland included in the reserve. The heather and gorse flower from June until September; the heather is purple and pink while the gorse is yellow. A variety of birds, animals and reptiles live on the heath; red deer, muntjacs, Dartford warblers, European stonechats, and European nightjars, as well as adders, slowworms, grass snakes and common lizards. It supports many unusual invertebrates as well, such as ant lions, digger wasps, mining bees, as well as the true lover's knot moth, and the emperor moth.

Eastbridge is a village in the English county of Suffolk. It is located approximately 4 miles (6.4 km) north of Leiston, 2 miles (3.2 km) from the North Sea in the parish of Theberton, immediately south of the Minsmere RSPB reserve. It borders the Minsmere River which cuts through an area of drained and undrained wetland known as the Minsmere Level. Eastbridge Windpump, which stood on the Minsmere Level marshes, is preserved at the Museum of East Anglian Life in Stowmarket. The marshes are also the site of the remains of the medieval chapel of St Mary which stands on the original site of Leiston Abbey. The chapel ruins date from the 12th-century and include a World War II pill box which was built into the walls to protect against invasion. The site is a scheduled monument. Located in Eastbridge is the Eels Foot Inn, an ale-house dating as far back as 1533 which obtained a full license to sell alcohol in 1950. Because of its proximity to the sea, the pub was a favourite stop of travellers, drovers and smugglers. The pub is the main feature of the small village. It is associated with folk music, and hosts a weekly gathering in which people sing songs and play folk tunes.

Sizewell Marshes form a 260-acre (105.4 ha) biological Site of Special Scientific Interest adjacent to Sizewell in Suffolk. It is in the Suffolk Coast and Heaths Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty, and is part of a 356-acre (144-ha) nature reserve managed by the Suffolk Wildlife Trust as Sizewell Belts. These unimproved wet meadows are designated by Natural England as important for their outstanding assemblages of invertebrates, with many nationally rare and scarce species, and of national significance for their assemblage of breeding birds typical of wet grassland. The aquatic flora are diverse, including the nationally scarce soft hornwort and fen pondweed.

Sizewell C nuclear power station is a project to construct a 3,200 MWe nuclear power station with two EPR reactors in Suffolk, England. The project was proposed by a consortium of EDF Energy and China General Nuclear Power Group, which own 80% and 20% of the project respectively. In 2022, the UK Government announced a buy-out to allow for the exit of CGN from the project and forming a 50% stake with EDF, though EDF expect this to fall below 20% following anticipated external investment. As of 30 June 2024, the project is 76.1% owned by the UK Government and 23.9% owned by EDF. The power station is expected to meet up to 7% of the UK's demand. The project is expected to commence in 2024, with construction taking between nine and twelve years, depending on developments at the Hinkley Point C nuclear power station, which is also being developed by EDF Energy and which shares major similarities with the Sizewell plant.

The remains of an unknown armed cargo vessel dating to the sixteenth to seventeenth century were identified off Dunwich, Suffolk, England in 1993. The site was designated under the Protection of Wrecks Act on 12 July 1994. The wreck is a Protected Wreck managed by Historic England.

The Suffolk & Essex Coast & Heaths National Landscape is an Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty in Suffolk and Essex, England. The AONB covers ancient woodland, commercial forestry, the estuaries of the Alde, Blyth, Deben, Orwell and Stour rivers, farmland, salt marsh, heathland, mudflats, reed beds, small towns and villages, shingle beaches and low eroding cliffs along 60 miles of coastline. Features include the coastal towns of Aldeburgh and Southwold, Bawdsey, Covehithe, Dunwich, Minsmere, Orford, Orford Ness, Sizewell, Thorpeness, Walberswick and the RSPB Minsmere Reserve. There are three National Nature Reserves in the area and many Sites of Special Scientific Interest. Three long-distance footpaths pass through the AONB: the Suffolk Coast Path, the Sandlings Walk and the Stour and Orwell Walk. In July 2020 the AONB was extended by around 38 square kilometres to cover land north of Brantham, and an area around Mistley and Wrabness in Essex. It was the first extension to any AONB in England since 2011.

Sizewell is an English fishing hamlet in the East Suffolk district of Suffolk, England. It belongs to the civil parish of Leiston and lies on the North Sea coast just north of the larger holiday village of Thorpeness, between the coastal towns of Aldeburgh and Southwold. It is 2 miles (3.2 km) east of the town of Leiston and belongs within the Suffolk Coast and Heaths AONB. It is the site of two nuclear power stations, one of them still active. There have been tentative plans for a third station to be built at the site.

Greyfriars, Dunwich was a Franciscan friary in Dunwich in the English county of Suffolk. The friary was founded before 1277 by Richard FitzJohn and his wife Alice and dissolved in 1538. The original site, which had 20 friars in 1277 when it first appears in records, was threatened by coastal erosion and the friary was moved inland in 1289. Many of the buildings are believed to have been destroyed on dissolution, with the remains used as a house, a town hall and a jail at various times. Modern remains consist of a precinct wall, two gatehouses and some two-storey walls believed to be the remains of a cloister building, possibly a refectory or infirmary building. The site was partly excavated in the 1930s and 1990s, with geophysical surveys being carried out on the site. The site was surveyed in 2011 as part of a dig by archaeological television programme Time Team. A geophysical survey using ground-penetrating radar confirmed a range of wall features and other anomalies in the precinct and trenches uncovered carved medieval stonework and medieval window glass fragments. Geophysical surveys suggest that the friary church may have been up to 60 metres in length. Some restoration work was carried out in 2008, including the strengthening of some buildings and repair of collapsed section of the precinct wall. The site was then placed on the Heritage at Risk Register, leading to a £250,000 restoration project in 2012 by English Heritage and Suffolk County Council. The management of the site was taken over by a local voluntary group, the Dunwich Greyfriars Trust, in October 2013. The transfer occurred after budget cuts by the county council meant that the running costs would no longer be met by the council. The remains are classified as a Grade II* listed building and most of the site as a Scheduled Monument.

Potton Hall Fields, Westleton is a 16.7-hectare (41-acre) biological Site of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI) west of Dunwich in Suffolk. It is in the Suffolk Coast and Heaths Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty. This site comprises two gently sloping fields on sandy, well drained soil. It has been designated an SSSI because it has a population of several thousand plants of the nationally rare red-tipped cudweed in large patches throughout the site. The plant is only found in two other counties in Britain. There is no public access to the site but it can be viewed from Sandlings Walk.