A nature reserve is living, breathing thing, every month it changes and either grows or dies according to the season. Below is the blog for 2008 extracted from the SHDC web site and edited to make it easier to read. To see the 2010 blog follow this link: Warden's Blog - 2010
A lot of hard work has gone into the reserve this year and to the untrained eye it looks as if little has been done, and this is just as it should be. Last year we were catching up, making good the neglect of four years when little was done, simply because there was no one in post to make sure the work was carried out. Now we are almost up to date on the renovations we can move forward. I am hoping to secure funding so I can put a set of steps down to the dipping platform from the top of the bank and perhaps a short board walk along the side of the pool from the platform to the other steps.
There is still remedial work to be done, much of it removing or reducing hawthorn trees that have been allowed to get too big. By opening up some of the woodland areas more light will be able to get in and we should see more of the plants that should inhabit the woodland floors. We had quite a bit of success this year and we hope but by the end of this work season we should see the reserve in the shape and format I am trying to achieve. Below is how the work went this year.
JANUARY
Regular visitors both to this site and to the reserve will know that I spent most of the summer and autumn 2007 in recovery from neuro surgery and that much of the work that needed to be done was not carried out. I returned to work in mid October, but I was not fully fit and getting to grips with work on the reserve took time. It meant that I needed help with some simple but fairly tough tasks clearing the reserve for the winter and getting ready for the spring flower season. I still need help, so IF you have some time to spare and fancy making positive contributions to the environment please contact me (see below for details).
During my convalescence I spent a lot of time just sitting on the reserve watching and listening, no sign of a Turtle Dove last year, but most of the other bird species turned up and made their presence known, (Turtle Doves appeared Summer 2009)the white throats and reed warblers were much in evidence and all the thrush family was represented. Muntjac deer are seen regularly and I find fresh spoor most mornings. The spoor of larger deer have also been seen, although no other sign of Roe deer were recorded by me, other visitors to the reserve report seeing larger deer in the adjacent playing field, the meadow and on the track at the edge of the reserve. I have left the pictures of the Common Spotted Orchid and the Rivulet Moth (Parazoma Affinitata) on the details page so that you can see what you missed. The Broad leaved Helleborines were definitely there last year and the work I am currently carrying out on the woodland walk should ensure that conditions are right for them to return next year too. Sadly the Lombardy Poplars have been declared unsafe in their current condition, so we have to take some drastic action to save the habitat. They are going to be pollarded to about 20 feet and some other minor work will be carried out on the other trees at the same time. This work, together with some tidying up will mean more light for the under storey. I am looking forward to a good show of woodland plants next spring.
Finally, an appeal for help, if you see it or hear it on the reserve, then please let me know. I am keen to hear of sightings of grass snake, newts etc., any bird that is out of the ordinary and ALL mammal sightings. I know about the Jay, Kingfisher, Greater Spotted and Green Wood Peckers, Kestrel, Sparrow Hawk and Hobby, White Throat and Reed Warbler, but what else is there? Has anyone seen Ratty the elusive water vole?
Early FEBRUARY
Now the new year is established we are getting into our stride tidying up the reserve. A meeting of Volunteers has been arranged for Friday morning, 1st Feb. We will meet at the small car park at the end of Chiltern Way, by the kiddies play area. Weather permitting we will walk around the reserve and introduce features to those who have not been here before. After the inevitable health and safety briefing we will discuss what needs to be done. The following week the Poplars in the Woodland Walk will be pollarded down the about 15 feet high. This is for health and safety reasons as to trees are well past their sell by date and timber has been falling off them in high winds. We hope the loss of habitat will be mitigated by increasing light into the under storey and I am looking forward to a bumper crop of spring plants and flowers there. Watch this space for updates - JG
Late FEBRUARY
The reserve has had its most severe haircut for many years. The poplar trees (all 58 of them) have been reduced to about 15 feet high and I have taken the opportunity to clear some old brash from underneath them. The effect does not look as bad as it might have done and it is now possible to see that the trees that have been under the poplars until now are in fact bigger than they looked. Most of the timber was either chipped on site and removed or taken away as logs but some of the wood has been used to create habitat piles and natural barriers. Poplar wood is soft and it will rot fairly quickly increasing biodiversity by giving a home to lots and lots of lovely bugs. Along with a couple of very hard working volunteers I am now just clearing the ivy and muck disturbed by the tree work and have begun work laying hedges. The effect is very dramatic and is bringing more light into the triangle and the path, that used to form a tunnel, from the triangle to the top of the steps up from the meadow. I am going to be completing the work there this week (28th/29th) and then clearing the hawthorn opposite the 'Memorial Oak' The extra light is already having an effect, our first clump of dog violets is blooming next to the path opposite the oak... tread carefully, it will be easily squashed - JG
MARCH
The end of March was very quiet, but only because I was taking the last of my annual leave. During the first two weeks of the month we completed the time sensitive pruning and hedge laying. The newly laid hedge on the path from the triangle to the steps out of the meadow is already sprouting new growth and the leaves are coming out on the hawthorn that has been cut. Sweet violets, lesser celandine, primroses and cowslips are all showing flowers in different areas of the reserve and leaves of many more species are coming through... watch this space. The birds are singing too... Robin, chiff chaff, chaffinch, blue tit, great tit, long tailed tit, green finch, gold finch, black bird, song thrush, mistle thrush, dunnock, kingfisher, wren and many more common birds are all declaring their presence. Too early for cuckoo and turtle dove yet, but I hope we will hear and see both this year. IF you hear or see anything out of the ordinary, please let me know. My programme for the next month is continuing with clearing out brash and seedlings that should not be there, this includes clearance of hawthorn scrub and the removal of a couple of small trees. The usual monitoring and litter clearance also continues and I have made a start on contacting local schools to get some children interested in what we are doing on the reserve.
APRIL
April crept in and rushed by, the quiet start was deceptive, with growth and new births all over the reserve. Nest building started in earnest, so we had to curtail most of the work have been doing, especially thinning the hawthorn brush. The bird surveys show that the first swallow was seen over Vernatt's drain at the end of the month with nearly all spring/summer migrants showing up and making the dawn chorus a really decent show. An early plant survey showed that the ADDERS TONGUE FERN was sprouting through, exactly on time and where we expected it to be. The yellow rattle and most of the other meadow plants are also showing and May should see some fantastic growth patterns.
MAY
"The Spring has sprung; the grass is riz, I wonder where those birdies is"? Words from an old rhyme remembered from childhood. Well, I certainly know where the birdies are now, on the Vernatt's reserve! Last month I said that the dawn chorus was a 'good show', now it is positively deafening. Beginning with the thrushes, including the blackbirds, mistle and song thrush all competing to be heard, the tiny wren and the dunnock also add their fair share of noise. The whole thing builds until after full light and stays a pleasant cacophony well into the morning. The reed and sedge warblers are here and nesting. Sit down on the pond steps any morning, especially when the sun is out, and you will see them flitting from their nests to a feeding spot and back; busy feeding their new broods. Several pairs of swallows are nesting under the old railway bridge and our resident kingfishers obviously have a brood. The male kingfisher and I have spent a lot of time watching each other, daring to be the first to move. I normally win, he has babies to feed. Their burrow is in the same place as last year and in the evenings both birds can be seen hunting on the Vernatt's drain and over the pond. The swifts returned just about at flower parade on the 6th of May and are now seen performing their aerobatics wherever the insects are flying.
The growth on the plants and trees is phenomenal. The hedge I laid in March is growing nicely and will be fully filled in with leaves and fresh wood by the end of the season, within a couple of years it will seem as natural as any other hedge on the reserve. Next Autumn/Winter I will be continuing the hedge laying programme and that should let some more light into dark corners on the reserve. The idea is to increase the light, but preserve the natural look of the place in which we have been working, and by doing so encourage plants that have been dormant for some time to show themselves. Work we carried out this year in February, March and April has paid off. The asparagus fern that has not been seen for some time sprouted and tempted as I was to use it for soup, it is now in full leaf. Many of the wild herbs that used to grow in the triangle have returned this year, some of them have not been seen since 2004. I have been out with our ecologist and have been very busy identifying and logging all the species.The star of the show has to be orchids, The common spotted is about to flower, with several of the plants showing spikes. There are currently six plants on site and hopefully the bunnies will let them flower this year! See you in June.
JUNE
The beginning of June held such promise, but sadly it deteriorated and far from being flaming, it was bit of a damp squib. The long range forecasts do not look good either; we could be in for a very damp summer. The dawn chorus has lessened as the second batch of baby birds are moving from being eggs to fledged chicks. The breeding males do not have to sing about their territories anything like as much, so early mornings will be quieter affairs. Still no sign of the turtle dove or cuckoo but we do have breeding bird of prey. I have heard the distinctive call of youngsters demanding food. I have not quite located the nest, but watch this space.
Botanically speaking it has been a good month with plenty of growth and all of the species we expected passing through their flowering stages. The yellow rattle showed well and the seed heads are rattling away ready to drop next year's crop. Sadly the bunnies did get the orchids. The plants are there looking very healthy but the flowers were nipped off before their prime. Much as I dislike doing it I may cage the plants next year to ensure we get a good show. The plants further down Vernatt's Drain bank put on a fine display.
One disappointment is the broad leaved helleborine. The beech hedge was not cut this year and I fear that conditions were too dark for the plants to show. Hopefully we will have budget enough to cut the hedges next year. Early June is the time that the drainage board cut the banks of many of their drains. The cutting is deliberately timed so the most birds are between broods. The day that the cemetery drain was cut I walked on to the reserve just as the board men were leaving. They told me that they had seen water vole leave a burrow as they were cutting. About 30 minutes later I was rewarded with the sighting of an Adult water vole swimming sedately up the channel. It stopped, sniffed the air and back tracked about 10 feet, it then climbed the bank and disappeared into a burrow. I have since seen adults several times. I have identified two burrows and have so far seen four youngsters. 'RATTY' is back!!!
JULY 2008
July has gone and so have most of the breeding birds. The dawn chorus is now a mere shadow of what it was and the reserve is a much quieter place. The stars of this month have been the Sparrow Hawks, a pair bred in the cemetery this year and have raised at least three chicks. The chicks fledged this month and can be heard calling from all over the cemetery and the reserve.
One of my regular informants has been keeping an eye on them and they have been seen learning to fly and hunt. The chicks made their first kill last week. It is great to have them and hear their haunting cry. Only a few swallows and swifts have been noted although the sand martin colony just down the Vernatt's Drain from the reserve has increased in size this year. Botanically the whole reserve is starting to shut down for the onset of autumn.
The meadow is now ready to be cut for hay and the contractor is booked and ready to go as soon as he can fit us in. I will continue to trim up the edges of the paths until the end of the autumn and then we will begin our winter work schedule, bringing more light into those areas that are still over grown. Ratty (the Water Voles) has been seen regularly on the Cemetery Drain and sightings of the Muntjac deer have been reported every week.
There are some concerns about use of the reserve by a small minority of people. Bylaws exist that prevent anyone from camping or doing anything on the reserve that may cause damage or inhibit the wildlife in any way. If you see people camping or having drinking parties etc on any part of the reserve please report the matter either to me on the contact details below, or to the local police.
There is a new page attached to this site, it contains images taken by me and the volunteers who tend the reserve. There is a link on the front page of the site. Hover the cursor over the thumbnail pictures and a title comes up, double click and the full image will display in a separate window .
AUGUST 2008
August is never a good month on a reserve, most of the visitors are gone or preparing to leave but there are still some nesting birds and summer flowers. The place needs tidying but it is too soon to start work, so a frustrating time.
This year is doubly frustrating as we have suffered some damage caused by people just who do not know or are just too ignorant to care about why the reserve exists. There has been quite a lot of poaching of fish from the pool and other damage that is really quite sickening. Removing dog faeces is one of the negatives that goes with the job, but having to call out bio hazard teams because some so called humans are using the reserve as a toilet is too much. When these people then spread their mess on the gate handles it is beyond a joke! We are also suffering damage to fences, gates, steps and to some of the hedges that were only laid last year, If you see any of this happening please let me know and I will report it to the police and hopefully be able to get damage repaired.
I have a very small budget to maintain the reserve and if I have to spend it repairing damage or clearing away mess left by inconsiderate people it means that projects I wanted to carry out next year will have to be put off.
SEPTEMBER 2008
Well, September passed quietly. I was on leave for almost half of it and was quite glad really. The onset of autumn is like waiting for an old friend to die, so you can get on with the wake!
The season of mellow fruitfulness sees all the animals that are going to stay fattening up for the cold weather to come. The plants and grasses are dying back and the leaves are turning just ahead of dropping. It is a frustrating time for those of us charged with caring for nature reserves. We have lots of work to do but cannot start until the dieback is well under way, the seeds have dropped and the sap has withdrawn from the trees.
It is also a time of planning, assessing the reserve and deciding what jobs need to be done to keep the place in tip top condition and to see what needs to be done to complete programmed projects, if we can afford them that is. Just like every other department in the council we are being asked to tighten our belts and reduce budgets. Halfway through the month and much of that work is done, things we have been thinking about have been committed to paper, but then nothing is set in stone, the weather will be the ultimate judge of what is done, and when.
We are planning some more hedge laying, we will be repairing steps and path edges - we are considering some work in the reed beds and of course there is the meadow. I am trying to bring back a little glade in the woodland above the meadow, but at the moment I am losing the fight with the common reed... We shall see, I am determined not to lose.
NOVEMBER
At last the work has begun, using a lightweight strimmer we are edging the paths and cutting back the growth there. Once this is done we can hopefully begin the heavier strimming and brush cutting, this will enable us to see what needs to be done further into the undergrowth and hopefully by then we will be able to commence our programme of pollarding and hedge laying.
The end of the month was predictably damp and we did not get the heavy strimming done. I did cut the steps in at either end of the pool and I am pleased with the results.
There has not been much birdlife about but then the sparrow hawks have been about a lot, so perhaps everything else is just keeping their heads down. I see fresh deer spoor nearly every visit, most of them are muntjac but some of the footprints are too large for them so I am keeping my eyes peeled to see if we have some roe deer.
The water voles have been busy and there are plenty of signs that the rabbit population remains healthy. I hope this weather clears up, I have too much to do to wait for it to dry out.
DECEMBER.
Oh what a damp and dreary time, I was on leave for the second half of the month and we did not achieve much in the first two weeks, so I will use this section to sum up the year
Considering that all the work carried out on the reserve has been done by one full time member of staff and just one volunteer I am really pleased with what has been achieved. Specialist contractors were appointed to do the tree work, reducing the Poplars in height. This was done purely for health and safety reasons and much to the consternation of the resident squirrels.
We were able to get the reserve cleaned up and most of the pathways trimmed in the autumn before the weather got too damp and we are hoping the conditions will improve in the new year so that the hedge laying and tree trimming programme can get underway.
The rest of the time has been spent keeping growth in check and monitoring the resident and visiting species. We have lots to do keeping up with the restoration and general maintenance. A very positive year with nearly all our targets met. We are now into January and so far all is well.
