On Sunday 20th September 8 volunteers helped to clear reeds from about 2/3rds of the pond at Quedgeley Local Nature Reserve, that had become overgrown. This opened up the pond to benefit local wildlife. Indeed in the process we came across frogs, a female toad, two common newts as well as dragonflies and a comma butterfly; a Great Spotted Woodpecker called from the top of one of the trees and later on we watched 8 Buzzards soaring above . We also began to cut back some bramble and clematis from nearby areas of grassland to improve the area for wildflowers.

Following on from the walk at Cleeve Hill in July we ventured forth onto Alney Island Nature Reserve in Gloucester. Quite a different type of habitat, much of it influenced by flooding but also areas with calcareous species.

Four of us set off from the reserve car park and only just the other side of the gate into reserve were looking at Willowherb, Tall Melilot (a member of the pea family), Knapweed and St John’s wort. Again the aim was to introduce some of the characteristics of the plants to aid identification. All together we were able to identify over 60 species as well as 8 species of butterfly. Alongside the cycle path we came across some damp grassland plants such as Gypsywort and Figwort, plus an area nearby with plants more associated with limestone grassland such as Common Centaury and Ploughman’s Spikenard.

It proved to be a fruitful morning in terms of plants and just goes to show that you don’t necessarily need to venture far to come across a wide range of species.

We hope to include some more of these walks in 2016 and also another Winter Tree ID event later in the year.

A reasonably bright but windy day was spent at Cleeve Hill Cheltenham looking at wildflowers.  Eight of us took part, led by Richard Catlin, an amateur wildflower enthusiast (and also treasurer of the group). We started from the golf club car park and headed across Cleeve Hill towards Prestbury Hill Nature Reserve. It didn’t take long before we were identifying some of the typical plant species to be found on limestone (calcareous) type grassland,  aiming to observe the characteristics to look for.  Species such as Rock Rose, Yellow-wort, Dwarf Thistle, Pyramidal Orchid, Wild Thyme and Salad Burnet were encountered, amongst many others. We were also lucky to spot a Humming-bird Hawkmoth as we sat down to lunch. Nearby was a patch of Fragrant and Common Spotted Orchids. On Prestbury Hill we came across several species of butterfly including Small Blue and a fleeting view of what may have been a Duke of Burgundy Fritillary (we can only hope).

An interesting time was had by all participants and hopefully, despite the rain lashing we got at the end, everyone went away having learnt a bit more about plant identification.

The National Trust wanted us to cut down some areas of hawthorn and bramble to open up the site and prevent the thorn taking over. 6 of us worked with Tim (the warden).

Continuing from where we left off 2 weeks ago:

And tackling a new area:

Although there is still much work for Tim to manage this site, much progress was done by the end of the day:

We enjoyed a fantastic sunset!

To keep the area clean and tidy, we burned what we cut. The bonfire got very hot by the end of the day!