AN INVESTMENT of £4.4 million will allow the Wildfowl and Wetlands Trust in Slimbridge to open the doors of the home that was the birth place of the conservation movement.

The home of Sir Peter Scott – “the patron saint of conservation” – at Slimbridge WWT was the site of the BBC’s first ever natural history programme which Peter presented live from his studio lounge in 1953.

The enormous grant from the Heritage Lottery Fund will go towards the centre’s £6 million project to restore the house and open its doors to people in the county and beyond.

Sir Peter’s pioneering TV career in the 1950s inspired many broadcasters, including Sir David Attenborough.

Sir David said: “Peter is and always will be the patron saint of conservation. Long before words like ‘biodiversity’ were coined, Peter looked out from that huge window in his house at Slimbridge and realised our lives are so linked with our natural world that we have to learn to love it and look after it.

“I think it’s wonderful that absolutely anyone will be able to sit in that same window in future years and feel just as inspired.”

The house is a key part of the story of modern conservation. The global system for designating species as threatened, endangered or extinct was largely devised there by Scott as he helped to found the Wildfowl & Wetland Trust (WWT), the World Wildlife Fund (WWF), the IUCN Species Survival Commission and many other organisations that have stopped many animals from going extinct.