Ours is a tour company run by naturalists for naturalists. We all have a passion for conservation, wildlife and wildlife tourism, and are committed to ensuring the long-term protection of species and habitats. Today, with the profits generated from nearly 40 years of operating our wildlife holidays around the world, our foremost mission now is to invest in, and thereby bring positive impact and benefit to, nature and the environment.
We centre our Sustainable Tourism Policy around three key commitments: Protecting Biodiversity, Reducing Carbon, and Travelling Responsibly, which you can read about below. In 2026, we published our first Impact Report, detailing our progress across our key commitments. Read it here.
Quick Links:
- Naturetrek Reserves in Ecuador
- Naturetrek Stuckindroin Reserve, Scotland
- Naturetrek Macchietelle Reserve, Italy
- Naturetrek Mingledown Meadow
The Naturetrek Reserves in Ecuador
The Naturetrek Reserves in Ecuador protect critically-endangered cloudforest high in the Ecuadorian Andes. By making a donation for every flight we have booked since 2007, we have set aside more than £625,000 to purchase land that was classified by WWF as one of the 200 most important wildlife corridors in the world due to its high levels of biodiversity. Over the years, by gradually purchasing land that would otherwise have been cleared for agriculture, we have successfully created an invaluable wildlife corridor between Llanganates and Sangay National Parks on the eastern slopes of the Ecuadorian Andes. This has helped protect the rare species that live here, enabled scientists to discover species new to science, created jobs for local communities and supported low-impact ecotourism.
The Naturetrek Reserves in Ecuador comprise three distinct reserves: Candelaria, Viscaya and El Encanto. Read more about each of them here.
The Naturetrek Stuckindroin Reserve, Scotland
The Naturetrek Stuckindroin Reserve sits at the head of Loch Lomond, in the Scottish Highlands of the Loch Lomond & The Trossachs National Park. Its 3,609 acres are home to diverse habitats, from loch shore and lochside meadows, to Scottish rainforest and native wood pasture systems, to high montane slopes of Ben Vorlich which are protected within an SSSI on account of their rich flora. Our goal here is a long-term one: to achieve the restoration of native Scottish (temperate) rainforest and other nature-rich habitats across the estate over the next 200 years. After taking ownership in August 2025, we have since signed an interim agreement with the RSPB to enable their immediate management of the estate – with a view to a long-term nature restoration partnership being agreed in 2026.
The Naturetrek Macchietelle Reserve, Italy
The Naturetrek Macchietelle Reserve lies in Italy's central Apennines, in the buffer zone of the ‘Collemeluccio-Mortedimezzo Alto Molise’ UNESCO Biosphere Reserve and adjacent to the Collemeluccio Natural Reserve. After purchasing the Macchietelle Estate in late 2023, we passed our new reserve by way of a 30-year stewardship agreement to the Italian conservation charities Salviamo L’Orso (Save the Bear) and IntraMontes. The Naturetrek Macchietelle Reserve is home to several species of rare herpetofauna, including Northern Spectacled Salamander and Italian Newt as well as an abundance of mammals. Its primary aim, however, is to support Salviamo L’Orso’s goal of building protected corridors between the two national parks and three regional parks/reserves of the Apennines, and to extend all these protected areas for the benefit of the endangered Marsican Brown Bear, a distinctive subspecies of which just 60 individuals remain.
The Naturetrek Mingledown Meadow, Hampshire
The Naturetrek office, Mingledown Barn, is set amongst 12 acres of grassland, formally used for livestock grazing, and years of agricultural activities had reduced the site’s ecological value. We have worked hard since moving here in 2014 to enhance our site for wildlife, rebalancing nature in the grounds around our offices. Over the years we have created a beautiful wildlife pond together with a south-facing 'butterfly bank' and plenty of log piles to provide nook and crannies for wildlife. We have also planted a mixed, native species hedgerow around our pond and orchard, including oak, elm and blackthorn to support our nearby Brown Hairstreak butterfly population. Since 2022, with the support of The Tree Council and Network Rail, we went on to plant some 5,000 trees to strengthen landscape connectivity through our land. We have also installed numerous nesting boxes and owl boxes, and some years the team has enjoyed watching Little Owls nest and raise chicks just outside the barn!
Reducing Carbon
Measuring our Carbon Footprint
From providing a sustainable income to local people living in wildlife-rich areas, to creating advocates for species conservation, we believe wildlife travel is a force for good for both the traveller and the destination. However, like everything, holidays have a carbon footprint. It is our responsibility to minimise this impact, not just for this year, but every year to come.
We've measured the total carbon footprint of our business operation - including our headquarters, tour operations, customer flights and business travel - and we're now on a mission to reduce it year on year. We know this won't be easy, but this isn't a reason to delay starting our journey towards net zero emissions. Right now we don't have all the answers, nor are we claiming to be perfect, but each year we will strive to improve.
For now, we continue to make donations to build our Naturetrek Reserve in Ecuador in order to offset flight emissions, and we encourage our clients to do the same.
The Naturetrek Reserves in Ecuador: Reducing the Carbon Emissions from our Flights
Naturetrek was one of the very first British tour operators to encourage its clients to contribute towards offsetting their carbon emissions and has done so since 2000. Since 2007, we have additionally been making contributions, at our own expense, for every flight that we book. We set aside £15 for every person booking a long-haul holiday with us, and £5 on behalf of each of our short-haul travellers, which to date has raised over £625,000 and funded our very own ‘carbon retention’ project.
In collaboration the Ecuadorian NGO, Fundación EcoMinga, we use these funds to build up our own ‘Naturetrek Reserves’, which has helped to link together the Llanganates and Sangay National Parks on the eastern slopes of the Ecuadorian Andes – an area of threatened primary cloud forest that has been classified by WWF as one of the 200 most important wildlife corridors in the world due to its high levels of biodiversity. This Naturetrek project has not only saved a valuable habitat and its endangered wildlife from deforestation, but it has also enabled us to prevent the release of an estimated 105,000 – 211,000 tonnes of carbon into the atmosphere, which instead remains held within its forests and soils.
We also encourage our clients to match our donation when they book their holiday, in order to further reduce the environmental impact of their trip. By matching our donation, you can help us to grow our ‘Naturetrek Reserves’, both locking up carbon that would otherwise be released into the atmosphere and preventing the National Parks from becoming isolated cloudforest islands, thereby protecting this valuable, extremely biodiverse habitat and its endangered wildlife.
Our Legacy
Naturetrek Contributions to Sustainable Tourism Over the Years
We are intimately involved in wildlife tourism and dependent on it as a business, making us acutely aware of the need to ensure the long-term protection of species and habitats. Our financial contribution to conservation causes has increased over the years with the growth of our business, and now stands at over £4.4 million. Some examples of our own projects and contributions include:
Supporting Butterfly Conservation
Our longstanding support of Butterfly Conservation between 2002 and 2024, as a Gold Corporate Sponsor and through our donation of 10% of the income generated from each of our butterfly-focused holidays annually, saw us raise over £266,700 to help protect the habitats of these endearing insects. Our donations have funded a wide variety of initiatives, including an 18-month project maintain and improve a discrete area of suitable habitat for the Duke of Burgundy in the southern Chilterns.
Koshi Tappu Wildlife Reserve
One of the finest and most important wetland wildlife reserves in Asia, Koshi Tappu Wildlife Reserve, was created largely to protect Nepal's last remaining population of wild Water Buffaloes, but is of even greater importance to migratory birds and endangered grassland birds and mammals. In the early 1990s, it was neglected by the tourism it deserved and not regarded nationally as a tourism destination of any note. This situation changed dramatically after we conceived and funded the creation of Koshi Tappu's first luxury tented camp: Koshi Camp. Our single-handed marketing of Koshi Camp, and the attractions of the Reserve, have – nearly 30 years later – put it firmly on the map of the must-go-to destinations of naturalists and birdwatchers worldwide. The encouragement and training of local staff and expert naturalist guides has been extended to include school and village visits, emphasising the benefits of birds, wildlife, conservation and tourism for all. We were delighted to gift a 50% shareholding in Koshi Camp to the local naturalists and conservationists who assisted in establishing this popular tourist wildlife camp, and in whose hands the future of the conservation of Koshi Tappu Wildlife Reserve lies.
Suklaphanta Wildlife Reserve
Such was the success of our initiative at Koshi Tappu Wildlife Reserve that, in 2008, we established a second tented camp at Suklaphanta Wildlife Reserve in far western Nepal. This remote and little-visited reserve protects the world’s largest population of the nominate race of the Swamp Deer, as well as many other mammals, including healthy populations of both Tiger and Leopard. However, it is for rare grassland birds that Suklaphanta is particularly special, amongst them the endangered Bengal Florican. It is our hope that, by encouraging tourists to this park, we will persuade both local people and the government of Nepal of the value of this important wildlife reserve. The encouragement and training given to local staff and naturalist guides has again been at the forefront of our work here.
Travelling Responsibly
Naturetrek’s founders, staff and tour leaders are naturalists and conservationists turned tour operators, and sustainable tourism has been a key part of Naturetrek’s ethos since the company began in 1986. We are, of course, utterly dependent on the well-being of the world’s wildlife for the success of our business… and the habitats, reserves and national parks that protect it. Thus, our core aims are, and always have been:
- To focus on visiting national parks, wildlife reserves and wilderness areas which do not benefit from the rewards of mass market tourism.
- To minimise our environmental impact by exploring in small groups and, as much as possible, on foot.
- To use local guides wherever possible… and to train them to the highest standards expected by today’s wildlife tourists.
- To involve local communities wherever possible in our operations, and to ensure that they receive a fair share of the benefits of wildlife tourism.
- To use small, locally owned, family-run accommodation, and similarly owned and operated specialist in-country partners with a wildlife/conservation bias and sympathy.
- To purchase local produce over imported goods.
- To fund and develop partnerships with local communities and naturalists in order to develop low-impact and environmentally friendly tourist facilities in exceptional wildlife areas. Koshi Camp and Suklaphanta Wildlife Camp are examples of such partnerships.
- To run our UK office (a beautiful barn conversion set amongst a 12-acre grassland site in the village of Chawton) in as energy-efficient a manner as possible.
- To encourage and develop a passion for wildlife and wild places amongst our customers (many of whom are novices, trying this form of holiday for the first time).
