Nine winners presented at ceremony hosted by TV’s Chris Packham

Conservation heroes from across the country were honoured at the third annual RSPB Nature of Scotland Awards hosted by naturalist, author and TV presenter Chris Packham.

The ceremony brought together 300 industry professionals, public sector organisations, community groups, politicians, charities and conservationists to the Sheraton Grand Hotel in Edinburgh.

Red squirrels, river regeneration and renewable energy were just some of the projects to scoop the top prizes after five judges whittled down the list to nine winners, across eight categories, with joint winners in the RSPB Species Champion Award.

Natural history and landscape photographer Laurie Campbell was the evening’s final winner. He was awarded the Lifetime Achievement Award.

It’s truly inspirational to see so many people working to conserve Scotland’s precious wealth of wildlife and habitats

His photographs regularly feature in magazines, books and exhibitions and his own picture library of over 120,000 images is the most extensive of its kind by any single photographer working in Scotland.

Stuart Housden, director of RSPB Scotland, said: “Congratulations to all of this year’s winners - it has been a real privilege to recognise and reward some truly inspirational projects.

“The Nature of Scotland Awards is an opportunity to honour the best and brightest in nature conservation and it’s encouraging to see so many people coming together from across the whole country to take action for wildlife. Scotland can truly say it has worthy champions giving nature a home.”

Chris Packham said: “It’s an honour to have been able to congratulate so many worthy winners at this year’s Nature of Scotland Awards.

“All of the projects were impressive and it’s truly inspirational to see so many people working to conserve Scotland’s precious wealth of wildlife and habitats. Conserving and restoring nature for future generations is so important and all of the effort and enthusiasm that goes into that is exactly what these awards recognise.”