Early legislation to protect birds, mammals and fishes was more concerned with sustaining an economic resource than the conservation of rare or endangered species. By the end of the sixteenth century there were acts intended to prevent over-fishing and the killing of wildfowl during the breeding season in the Broads. However, it is unlikely that they were ever enforced. A further act of 1770 made it illegal to net, drive or take teal, wigeon and other waterfowl between July and August because of ‘the great damage and decay of the breed of wildfowl’. Again, this act, along with those protecting the fisheries, was widely flouted. in 1857 the Norwich and Norfolk Anglers’ Society was founded to protect fish stocks which were suffering from poaching and over-fishing.

This all changed in the second half of the nineteenth century, which saw a growing concern over the destruction of both ancient monuments and wildlife and the beginnings of efforts to legislate to protect both. This was stimulated by an increasing awareness of the gradual spread of towns and cities alongside industrialisation, and the growing ease of transport for a greater proportion of a rising population. Spurred on by education and a growing middle class, an awareness of natural and cultural history, stimulated also by the popularity of romantic poets, novelists and artists, was becoming common among more than just the traditional landowners. National societies for the protection of the countryside were proliferating, the earliest of which was the Commons Preservation Society (1869). While many, such as the Smoke Abatement Society, had very specific aims others, such as the National Trust and the Selborne Society, named after the famous naturalist Gilbert White of Selborne and founded in 1885, were more general. in fact, in an address to the Selborne Society in 1900 Mr Bryce stated that societies aimed at the preservation of nature should be linked to those caring for ancient monuments. However, legislation for the protection of the natural and historical elements of the environment remained strictly separated.

Protecting the natural world

A worry for the Norfolk naturalist Henry Stevenson was the decline in the numbers of birds and plants.