First work party of the year

As mentioned before, I have been wardening at Skylarks nature reserve at Home Pierrepont since autumn 2013. I lead a group of volunteers once a month, just doing a bit of habitat management on site.

We've been overshadowed by all the major work going on at the reserve this year. There's new wader habitat, islands and sand martin banks at Blotts pit, and other work going on over at the old skylarks reserve, but we're trying to keep things ticking over with the group too.

A Frosty Start

A new storage container has been put on site which will make life a lot easier, and its somewhere to keep the tea stuff, which is important. It just needs a lick of paint now!

 

This month I was joined by my volunteers to make a decent sized group of 9 on a cold and frosty morning. We were clearing some birch and sycamore scrub which has been slowly taking over the grassy spoil heaps near to the new entrance to the site. Hopefully it will encourage some more grassland species to grow here, but to be fair there isn't much there anyway and it'll just serve to make it look a bit tidier!

Winner of the 'neatest brash pile' award

The next task was to clear some vegetation from the old pathway leading from the container, which hopefully will become the main thoroughfare into the reserve, diverting footfall away from more sensitive areas and beyond the wildlife trusts boundary.

Before

 

After... just more sun...

We mainly cleared some sycamore and elder scrub which was beginning to encroach, and just left some brash piles and dead hedges to the sides of the path. It hasn't made a drastic change but certainly looks better and feels more inviting. Hopefully the trust will leave the thick Ivy growth bordering the path as it is great nesting habitat and also excellent for invertebrates too!

We ended the day pulling up tree roots from the shingle on the works pond in an attempt to fight the invasive willow and birch scrub that has been encroaching there. There still plenty to do and its a good workout, so maybe we'll come back to that one some other time...

Also a Redshank flew overhead, so that's another species for the yearlist!