Boosting birdlife in a local forest has scooped an award for the charity which created the woodland.

The conservation charity, Woodland Trust, which has been planting Heartwood Forest in Sandridge, has been recognised for the range of birds there.

An event hosted by the NIAB - an international centre for plant research - saw the woodland honoured in the Inaugural Redlist Revival National Biodiversity Awards.

Heartwood Forest was given the Bench-Mark Award, for being in the top 10% of 3,000 wildlife sites with a range of priority farmland birds including linnets and skylarks.

The Heartwood site was in the top 10 per cent for range of priority farmland birds and in the top one per cent of densities with the number of linnets and skylarks, narrowly missing out on one of the Tree of Life Awards for highest density in the UK.

Ken Smith, chair of the Heartwood environmental monitoring group, said: “This award is a great recognition of the value of the newly-established habitats at Heartwood and the efforts of all those who have worked so hard to create them.”