Time for a round-up from the Dove Stone wardens and conservation volunteers team. This month it's paths, blanket bog restoration and seed collecting and planting.
' We continued work on a blanket bog restoration site south of Chew reservoir using heather bales cut and flown out to new parts of the site during the first week. We've made great progress as the new bales haven't been out in the rain for long and so are lighter and therefore easier to move and place than those we had left over from last year ! We had one very wet session and one that was windy and cool, but mainly dry...
photos courtesy of Ian Hughes
...We've also continued the footpath improvement work we started in August, working on paths near the Outdoor Education Centre at Crowden, including the path which runs from the centre to the Pennine Way. We've replaced sections of worn out boardwalks which take the path over some of the boggier parts of the hill. This involves diverting water which has started to flow down part of the path as it's rotting the original steps. Despite looking pretty similar, individual pieces of timber can have very different properties, including being extremely hard when you're trying to get a nail in which is a good reminder of the nature of working with natural materials. We ended up with quite a few bent nails. However, a heavy weight hammer and a bit more muscle power seemed to do the trick !
...A good turnout on the day that we went up Chew Valley and worked around Charnel Clough planting Bell Heather seeds and acorns. We collected the acorns on the walk up from the Dove Stone car park by from falling acorns from Oak trees on the valley sides whilst the Bell Heather seeds were collected whilst walking to and from the blanket bog restoration site earlier in the month. The hillsides in and around Charnel Clough have very steep slopes which are also very rocky which made planting quite arduous work. The upside is though that you get a fantastic view down the valley from the hillside. We spotted a couple of raptors flying over the valley but they were too far away to positively id. We've also collected seedheads from Bog Asphodel and we'll plant this elsewhere at a later date.
Thanks as usual go to John for keeping us updated. More soon...