Belfairs Park Nature Reserve

Belfairs Woodland Centre introduces visitors to the 1160-acre Living Landscape, a third of which is woodland, including a number of outstanding sites valuable for nature conservation. It is a crucial green lung surrounded by urban areas and provides a tremendous green space of great importance to local people of the Boroughs of Southend and Castle Point.

Much of the woodland is officially ‘ancient woodland’; some is more than 1,000 years old, making it the earliest woodland recorded in Essex. The woodlands are home to a number of historic landscape features and a wide variety of flora and fauna.

Belfairs Woodland Centre is a visitor, community and education centre. It is an important gateway to the Belfairs & Daws Heath Living Landscape, in south Essex, where Essex Wildlife Trust and Southend-on-Sea Borough Council are working, together with many partners and local people, on conservation and education activities, to preserve this fantastic landscape for future generations. The striking, wooden-clad building has been constructed sympathetically to its environment. Inside, there are an education hall (also available to hire as a meeting hall), shop, information displays and refreshments area.