“Great Scott!” Hello from West Sedgemoor, Greylake and Swell Wood. I’m Tom and I am the final residential volunteer to check into the blog. Well after the last two outstanding blogs I have big shoes to fill (so wish me luck!). I am going to take you back to the future ‘Wait A Minute, Doc. Are You Telling Me You Built A Time Machine!’
It is the year 2025, (five years from now!). Swell Wood is carpeted by a mosaic of flowers, rich with the hum of insects, a path snaking its way through glades and rides, with the wind rustling the canopy and the musical song of birds enriching your ear buds. Something like the picture below.
Image Copyright RSPB Images
Why picture this in ten years’ time? Well a new decade sparks a new project at West Sedgemoor; we have a vision for Swell Wood. The hope is that one day Swell Wood could look more like this. Work began this week on the woodland trail as we started to coppice trees to create rides (linear trackways) and glades (openings within a woodland). The aim is to remove parts of the dense canopy and expose more areas on the woodland floor. This is new and exciting work so it will be interesting to see what happens over the next few years and hopefully one day the reserve may look like the photo above. Here is what we have completed so far.
Image Copyright Paul Parmenter
At West Sedgemoor this week we have also been tackling the horrible hedge as discussed in a previous blog. We set out to hedge lay in the Garden of Eden. It was wet, we faced a wall of bramble, knee deep ruts filled with water and blackthorn the size of trees. The team tackled it with all they had, bit by bit progress was being made. A year on, fresh out of the holidays, we re-joined the action and finally the hedge was ready to lay! Now the hedge is taking shape and the progress is incredible and by the end of the next week we hope that section will be completed. This does mean however that another wall of bramble will need to be tackled! But with the recent barn owl sightings it makes it worthwhile. But less of that, for now here are the pictures of the newly created hedge.
And finally the other exciting news from Greylake this week is the completion of repairs to our Lookout hide. So, you can sit in comfort looking over the amazing spectacle of wildlife.
That’s all for this week I am going to make like a tree and get outta here.
Tom.