Privacy policy

This page explains how the Big Wildlife Garden uses any information you give to us, and the ways in which we protect your privacy.

Any changes in our privacy policy will be posted on this page, so regularly checking here means you will be aware of what information we collect, how we use it, and under what circumstances, if any, we share it with other parties.

The Data Controller of this site is Natural England.

Under the Data Protection Act 1998, we have a legal duty to protect any information we collect from you.

As a condition of the site’s Terms of Use, you must give us permission to send you email messages that directly relate to your use of this service.

However, you choose whether we can contact you for any other purpose. We do not pass on your details to any third-party or government department unless you give us permission to do so. If you have given us permission to contact you, we may use the information to improve the Big Wildlife Garden by:

  • Contacting you by email for feedback on the Big Wildlife Garden
  • Occasionally sending emails about new features or opportunities or other wildlife gardening information that we think you may find interesting, using the email address you have provided

What information do we collect?

You have to complete an online registration to use most of the Big Wildlife Garden website, which includes supplying some personal information about yourself / your gardening group and your garden. We use this to help us understand who is using our site so we can develop new features. We may use this to generate some aggregated statistics on usage, which we may publish on the homepage, but we will not reveal any information about your individual registration.

You must also grant us permission to send you any email messages that directly relate to your user account. To do this, we must collect a contact email address. For more details read our Terms of use.

Information made public through the Big Wildlife Garden

If you choose to join the Big Wildlife Garden then your garden name, description and any picture you upload will become visible on the Big Wildlife Garden map to all visitors to the site. The marker pin on the map will relate to the postcode or longitude/latitude you provide. If you don’t want to provide your full postcode eg GL50 3RA, you may choose to supply only the first half eg GL50.

If you choose to share your Journal and Survey entries with Big Wildlife Gardening “Friends”, this information will become visible to other registered members whom you accept as Friends. You can delete friendships at any point and your Journal and Survey entries will no longer be visible to that member.

Natural England will be able to run reports on survey results in order to generate and publish statistics, but we will not identify you individually.

Cookies

A cookie is a text-only string of information that a website transfers to the cookie file of the browser on your computer's hard disk so that the website can remember who you are.

This site uses session cookies so that it can remember any changes you make to the interface, such as adding details to ‘My Garden’, along with which gadgets you leave open, or closed, or reposition on the page.

Cookies also allow you, when you are signed in, to navigate to another site and then return to the page where you left. Or, if you accidentally close your browser and then re-launch, it will take you to the last place on the site that you visited.

No information is stored on your computer and no personal data is obtained from this software.

Registration

When you register to use this site, you are solely responsible for maintaining the security of your account. For example, this means that you may not share your password or let anyone else access your account. If you have reason to believe that your account is no longer secure, please let us know immediately by emailing: web@naturalengland.org.uk.

Transferring to the Natural England website

Some of the links on this site take you through to the Natural England website. You should be aware that the Big Wildlife Garden operates in a different way to this site as the Natural England website offers a wider range of services and information. Please be aware of the Privacy policy on Natural England’s website.

Links to other sites

Although our Terms of Use advise users against the use of links to external websites in the information they post, this may happen. You need to be aware that this privacy policy does not cover any of these websites. These sites should have their own privacy policy. You should always be aware of this when you are moving to another site and read their privacy statement.

Some of the links we include for more information on gardening topics take you out to external specialist gardening and wildlife websites. These sites should have their own privacy policy. You should be aware of this when you are moving to another site and read their privacy statement.

We do not pass on any personal information you have given us to any other site.

Feedback

You can send us your feedback by emailing web@naturalengland.org.uk

If this feedback is asking for information, we may need to contact other government departments to find that information. If your question is technical, we may need to pass it to our technology suppliers. We do not pass on any of your personal information when dealing with your enquiry. Once we have replied to you, we keep a record of your emails for six months for reference and audit purposes, after which it is deleted.

Access to your information and contacting naturalengland.org.uk

For any enquiry or concern about our privacy policy, or to request access to your personal data contact our Enquiry Service via:
Email: enquiries@naturalengland.org.uk
Enquiry Service
Natural England
Northminster House
Peterborough
PE1 1UA
Tel: 0845 600 3078

We have to provide you with a readable copy of the personal data that we keep about you within Natural England’s service standards of 20 working days. There is no charge. Evidence of proof of your identity will be required.It is both in our interest and yours to hold accurate data. If the data we hold on you is inaccurate in any way, where appropriate, you may have the data:

  • erased
  • rectified or amended
  • completed

Dispute

We aim to ensure that we have resolved any matters satisfactorily, however if you are not satisfied with our response you may contact:
The Information Commissioner
Wycliffe House
Water Lane
Wilmslow
Cheshire
SK9 5AF
Tel: 01625 545700
Fax: 01625 524510
Website: www.ico.gov.uk