It’s feeling rather autumnal here at Langford in the last week or so, especially as we have started doing some real habitat management work on site again, the first of the year after the breeding season. We had a very successful volunteer Sunday last weekend as we cleared overgrown vegetation from in front of the viewing screen and from along the footpath and brushcut some nice viewing channels into the reed edge. These channels in the reed are ideal areas for bitterns and other birds using the reedbed to feed and with a nice wide channel cut in view of the screen, hopefully anyone visiting will have a better chance of glimpsing the elusive birds. The day was rounded off nicely by two big bonfires – everyone’s favourite job!
Yesterday we welcomed a team of volunteers from Capital One onto site for a community workday. 14 people arrived ready to get stuck into some willow removal and burning down on Phase 1. After only a couple of hours they had successfully cleared all the encroaching willow from the right hand side of the reedbed and had two good bonfires on the go burning the brash. In the afternoon, the group helped to move some more cut reed from the Phase 1 island onto the main bank and got the whole lot burnt. Here we have opened up some of the channels that have been overgrown with reed, again creating some ideal habitat for birds to feed within the reedbed and also viewable from the screen, so keep your eyes peeled! The day was very successful and everyone enjoyed themselves. We may even have recruited ourselves some new volunteers from it!
Also on site this week we have been continuing with building the polytunnel and have been digging trenches alongside it in order to bury the edges of the plastic sheeting. Soon we will be ready for the polythene to go on and then we can go ahead and dig in and line the bays ready to house the reeds. It’s proving to be a big job, but good fun and it will be great when it’s finished!
Wildlife news this week includes a few nice waders on site including green sandpipers, common sandpipers and greenshank, plentiful little egrets, two jays seen on the public footpath and the best bird of the week has to go to Michael and Neil, who spotted an osprey over Phase 1 on Monday. There are still a few insects hanging on too, despite the cooler weather lately. Butterflies still present on site include small tortoiseshell, red admiral, whites, small copper, brown argus, small heath, common blue and a single painted lady, spotted by Graham Gamage last week. There are still plenty of common darter dragonflies around as well as the odd migrant hawker.