Hello
I have been keeping the Tuesday and Thursday work party participants busy this week clearing up the storm damage. Our regular volunteers were boosted this half term week as we had 4 young men volunteering as part of their Duke of Edinburgh. On Tuesday we cleared the semi fallen sallows to open up access to the gadwall hide, cleared the rest of the fallen branches from the turnstile area, fished out of the lagoon and mended the panels on the ramp, removed a cracked sallow from near the bittern pool and another that had gone over at the roots, and started to clear the sallow off the Draper hide, so a busy day. Thursday saw us continuing the clear up. We erected the fallen Barn Owl box (while it was on the ground i was able to remove quite a few pellets so will have fun disecting them) cleared up a few fallen trees from the kingfisher loop, raked and swept debris from hides and trails and finished clearing the sallow from the Draper hide and repaired the roof so this is now open. Sorry for any incovienence caused while we carried out the clear up but all hides and trails are now open.
The HMWT have informed us that there is no access to the Otter hide but the trail through the turnstile and back tot he visitor centre is clear.
Yesterday we also started to clear the trees that will make way for the kingfisher bank on the west bank of Draper, so keep an eye on this area when you are here and you may see some changes as we approach christmas.
Fingers crossed that the predicted stom for this weekend is not too bad!
thanks
vicky