Behind the picnic place at Fiveways, beyond the hedge, is a deep, deep ditch. The Friends have been clearing this ditch, cutting back the old hedges and haloing the oak trees (nos.5503 to 5507) that stand on the far bank. If you look over the bridge where all the paths meet, you will see where they have been working.
Continue reading “Primrose ditch”
A veteran oak tree is usually somewhere between 200 and 400 years old. These are trees that have local historical significance or that play important roles in a particular biosphere or landscape. In the reserve we have many notable and veteran oak trees, numbered and mapped.
Continue reading “Haloing oak trees”
Last week, Frank Lamerton and Pete White, both FoSCP volunteers and parkrunners, dug channels to clear the floodwater from the central path between the decorated bridge and the big pond, the first area to flood every winter and the last to drain.
Continue reading “Drains and consequences”
After sending yesterday’s pictures of the wetland scrapes in Lambrok Meadow, our in-house photographer Simon Knight went back to the reserve to find all its water features, scrapes, ponds, ditches and streams, full to overflowing. Go carefully out there.
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Background.
The following programme of actions was taken as an outcome of the review of the park on 27th January 2013 by the Wiltshire Countryside Team and Friends of Southwick Country Park (FoSCP). It is intended that this is a living document: a record of previous projects and tasks conducted and an update of works carried out during 2022, a review of the reserve in general, and suggestions for possible future progress.
The Lambrok is full to overflowing – nice to see after all those weeks of drought but go carefully.
All images taken in the reserve 20.12.2022 by Clive Knight
SET-ASIDE
Some years ago, an area at the top of Kestrel Field was set aside from the rest of the field and its agricultural calendar. The reserve would be unmanageable without the help of our tenant farmer, but we also recognise that the twice yearly grass-cut does damage the habitat of some of our wildlife species.
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by Ian Bushell
Our Tree Officer, Rich Murphy, has been running chainsaw monitoring sessions with Clive, Phil and myself to check our competence to fell trees in the reserve. The reserve belongs to the county and they are the people who pay to insure us.
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There are two public footpaths that cross the reserve: SWCK53 and SWCK54.
Alan and Sarah, long-term Friends of Southwick Country Park, have been clearing SWCK54 where it exits the reserve through a kissing gate on the north west side of Sleepers and heads to Wingfield. Hard work maintaining a public right of way among the overgrown brambles and nettles – thank you.
To make it easier for you to access the reserve’s litter bins, we have laid flagstones through the muddy approaches that inevitably grow around the bins once the wet winter weather has set in.
Dog faeces on the reserve’s paths are unpleasant and unsightly; in the fields they are a source of infection for the animals that will eat next summer’s hay; everywhere and anywhere, they are a danger to the health of our visitors, their children and their pets. Bag it and bin it, please.
Thank you
Our Local Nature Reserve status is being celebrated with new signs.
Pictures by Ian Bushell
Scrapes 2 and 3 of Wiltshire Wildlife Trust’s ABBA project will be backwaters lying alongside Lambrok Stream. A backwater is essentially a shallow pond connected to a waterway, providing still-water habitat away from the flow and turbulence of the main stream.
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Wiltshire Wildlife Trust’s ABBA project is creating three wetland scrapes in Lambrok Meadow.
Continue reading “A new pool”
Wiltshire Wildlife Trust is undertaking a 5 year project of “practical action, innovative community and business engagement and high-level strategic planning across the River Biss and its tributaries”. The project is called ABBA: A Better Biss Approach.
Continue reading “ABBA”
Clive Knight’s weekend picture of the heritage orchard shows how quickly it is recovering from the grass fire of August 20th.
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At the end of August, Ian checked the pond that we are developing with Wiltshire Wildlife Trust in the hope of attracting great crested newts to the reserve.
(Here are some links to previous posts about the pond’s development: ONE TWO THREE)
Read on for Ian’s report
Volunteers from the team of conservationists who care for the upkeep of the Park had a stand at Southwick Show on Bank Holiday Monday August 29th. To the relief of the volunteers, the weather was lovely and the visitors were very supportive.
Thanks to all the contributors, we had an excellent selection of goods for people to buy – which they did and we raised £200 for the purchase of additional plants for the Park.
Joan Jones (Chairman FoSCP)
It’s September: time to think about helping your garden’s wildlife through the rigours of the coming winter. This is the first in a series of posts that we hope might help.
Continue reading “Winter Garden: 1”
by Ian Bushell
As promised, a report on the chainsaw course that ran for four days from Tuesday 30th August to Friday 2nd September at Roland Heming, Fox Ridge, Motcombe. Clive Knight, Phil Riddle and myself attended.
Continue reading “Chainsaw”
This record-breaking drought is drying up the reserve’s ponds and streams. Please help us maintain the quality of what little water is left by keeping your dogs out of the pond for the time being. Thank you
by Ian Bushell
After the Wednesday Work Party had cleared away the vegetation from both sides of the dam, the contractor soon set to work.
Continue reading “Fixing the dam: part 2”
The dam at the downstream end of the big pond has been leaking.
Continue reading “Fixing the dam”
Water voles are protected under the Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981. Are we doing enough to ensure the protection of the reserve’s water voles?
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Ian Bushell conducted a butterfly transect in the reserve on Thursday. Butterfly transects are the way in which we measure changes in the population of the reserve’s butterflies from year to year.
Continue reading “Butterfly transect”
Southwick Country Park Nature Reserve 