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Joe Harris (RSPB Langford Lowfields Site Manager)

Every year we do a lot of management work on the reserve to make it as suitable as possible for the ‘waders’ that breed here. Waders are a group of birds with long legs, that live near water and nest on the ground. They are often associated with wild places such as Otmoor and we have good populations of four wading bird species on the moor; lapwing, redshank, snipe and curlew. During the summer months, after their breeding season, when the grassland fields are dry and it’s safe to take the tractor out, improving the habitat for these birds is a major focus for us. (Lapwing photo below taken by Nigel Forrow).
 
 
This summer has been particularly dry and this enabled us to bring our secret weapon onto the reserve; the rotary ditcher! You may well have seen this large, yellow machine being towed round the moor behind a massive tractor, flinging out clods of mud as it goes.
 
We have lots of what we call ‘footdrains’ on Otmoor, these are essentially shallow ditches with gently sloping sides, that provide prime muddy feeding areas for hungry lapwing, snipe and redshank on the hunt for insects. The rotary ditcher, run by RC Baker, is the perfect machine for enhancing these shallow water features, deepening and widening them slightly in order to clear out the vegetation, which has built up since they were created. It maintains the shallow sloping edges of the footdrains and the deepening means they can hold water and provide soft damp mud for a longer period during the bird breeding season. A large number of footdrains were widened across the reserve, on Big Otmoor, Greenaways and Malt Pit.

Perhaps more importantly, the rotary ditcher was also put to work on land across the ‘Futurescape’ area, in which Otmoor is situated. Our local Futurescape is called the Upper Thames River Valleys and is an area in which we are targeting our work with farmers and partners to benefit nature. As part of this work, we advise farmers on how to manage their land for breeding wading birds such as lapwing and curlew, including the creation of vital shallow features – footdrains!
 
In August 2013 the rotary ditcher visited 7 farms in the Upper Thames River Valleys area, creating over 4500 metres of footdrains, which will provide lots of feeding areas for breeding birds as part of the farmers’ HLS schemes (Higher Level Stewardship schemes are a type of agri-environment funding scheme, which allows farmers to receive payments for managing their land in a way that benefits the environment). Last summer it was too wet to bring this machine onto any of the sites in the Futurescape and so it was great to see it in action. The work that farmers are doing in the area is helping to make the Upper Thames River Valleys better for nature.
 
If you would like to find out more about the Upper Thames River Valleys Futurescape and the Futurescape approach have a look at following links; http://www.rspb.org.uk/futurescapes/ http://www.rspb.org.uk/futurescapes/upperthames/