Canvey Wick: the Essex 'rainforest' that is home to Britain's rarest insects

Nearly 2,000 invertebrate species - from predatory wasps to explosive beetles - flourish in this unique nature reserve in the ruins of an oil refinery on the ThamesAround a roundabout in the Thames estuary, beyond a Morrisons supermarket and just off an old concrete road, stand great hummocks of bramble, scrubby hawthorn and silver birch. An old car seat is dumped in tangled grass amid the ruins of an abandoned oil refinery.These desolate flatlands, behind where the old Thames does flow, do not look like a biodiversity hotspot. But Canvey Wick is a "brownfield rainforest": one of Britain's most precious nature reserves, it is an atmospheric, accidental landscape that teems with some of the country's rarest insects. Continue reading...