The weather gods and goddesses blessed us once again as it stayed dry, and even better, down in the Reservoir Basin we were out of the cold wind. The plan was to clear around 50% of the Phragmites (Common Reed) that was occupying one of the bigger scrapes, leaving sufficient to provide sustenance for the Reed Buntings that were watching us from the bushes and flying overhead, whilst permitting some fresh growth from the year ahead.

With two of us in waders chopping back the plants in potentially waste-high and deeper water, the others tackled the edges and bundled it up to provide invertebrate habitat among the Hawthorn hedging.

Thanks to Judi, Paul, Mark, Ali, Maria and Tom (in no particular order) for their assistance the job was done. There were plenty of signs of small mammal activity on the edge of what is a quite a large scrape and hopefully this includes Water Vole, that have been absent from records since the Internal Drainage Board destroyed a major population some 15 years before.

Thanks must also be made to the regular gentleman dog walker who was collecting all the bags of dog poo left lying around. He said to me that people leaving it “made him ashamed to be English.”

Next work party 15 February 10:30 onward at the Pond. Coppicing and clearing ready for this years tansy plants and Tansy Beetles.

Reed cutting

Phragmites clearing 25012015