Hello again, time for another Labrador Bay blog!
This week we have finished our work at Labrador Bay for this year, where we are restoring grassland to benefit Cirl Buntings. We had another Thursday work party day there this week to remove more small trees and scrub, and Andrew and Ezechiele are back there today to finish burning leftover material, as we cannot leave any piles of brash on site. There are also a few log piles and cut off tree stumps that should ideally be moved to the woodland surrounding the future grassland area although these can be moved later in the year if needed. Leaving brash and log piles prevents grass from coming up and also increases the quantity of nutrients in the soil, which encourages scrubby growth from coming back up. Removing these would also allow sheep to graze the area more thoroughly.
We have cleared the majority of the re-growth this year, down to the bottom of the field. There was quite a bit of re-growth from old tree stumps, which we have cut and treated with herbicide. There was also a lot of Buddleia and young Sycamores which needed to be cut and treated, as they are invasive and prevent other, native plants from growing.
We are slowly getting towards restoring it to grassland, and as long as we keep removing scrubby re-growth every year, less scrub and fewer trees will grow back. The end result will be a mixture of different habitats, which benefits a lot of wildlife including Cirl Buntings, the main focus of the work.
There are some photos of our work kindly provided by Steve Elcoate in the photos section of the Labrador Bay page.
Thanks for reading
Mark