If you have visited Wallasea Island in the past couple of weeks you may have noticed that along with the Marsh Flat Trail being closed, there are now some rather large yellow trucks on site. So the trucks relate to the reason behind the closure of the trail as it’s the beginning of the end for the habitat restoration works on Wallasea Island with BAMS working on Grass Farm Lagoon. The remedial works will include replacing the current sluices to allow us better control of the water flowing from Allfleets Marsh. They will also be creating a berm, which is a bank of earth, allowing in future for us to work on the surrounding ditches and lagoons without having to drain the main lagoon. There will also be installed a weir in the berm which would allow for the main lagoon to be drained if ever there was work needed to be done.
Despite the works ongoing, the main lagoon has been kept full to help support breeding birds including avocet, mediterranean gull, common tern and black headed gull which are some key species for Wallasea. This year the lagoon has also supported a number of redshanks and lapwings as well.
We hope that the works will be completed by September but that the trail will be reopen prior to that. Thank you for your patience and we will keep you updated when things have moved along.