For the 2^nd time and the final task of the year, we visited one of our favourite sites that we have worked on for many years – Hempsted. It was very well attended with the best turn out of the year with 13 of us including 3 new volunteers.

Hempsted is maintained as a nature reserve as its original function as final water treatment settling lakes is now redundant leaving a wildlife haven with an abundance of wildlife attracted to the man- made lakes there.

Much of our work has involved maintaining the edges of the lakes freeing them up from decaying old trees, which have grown out into the water, becoming rotten and mouldy. This stimulates more diverse plant growth and improves the visual appeal of the lakes and this was our main focus again this task. To see the abundance of new growth come through over the years is very satisfying.

We continued with this task focusing on the next section along the bank with some particularly dense thickets of trees, requiring some sawing through of established tree trunks and branches growing out into the water… most if it covered in moss and algae, careful to negotiate the smelly waters edge which could quickly rise above the welly line!

 

Several volunteers attended to some path clearance and one member saw to some maintenance of the on site shed which was leaking from the roof and I and the warden cleared much brush and vegetation from around a small row boat which has not seen daylight for quite a few years! The boat used to be used years ago apparently by someone who used to conduct bird surveys

We are hoping to get the boat back in action to row around the lake for volunteers who would like to venture out on the water!

Driving a passage through to the lake

The kettles were fired up for a hot drinks and mince pie break which I combined with lunch at 12 p.m as our day wrapped up at 1.45 – a shorter day than usual but because of the cold and good progress due to the numbers we had out, it made sense.. Tools also have to be returned to the stores in the light so our days in Winter are a little shorter.

Our energetic volunteers carved through the undergrowth like a cyclone

Another successful and enjoyable task, meeting up with friends to conclude our activities for 2022

Churchdown Park Task Report

20 Nov 22

Eight volunteers came to the wildlife area near Churchdown Parish Council Offices to help maintain the site, following the management plan which was prepared for the site by Candy. We were welcomed by Ann and Stuart who oversee the popular site for the Parish. The main task was to clear reeds and vegetation from two of the wildlife ponds, to prevent bulrushes from dominating and to provide a diverse habitat.

Trina, Lorraine and Chris getting stuck into the first pond:

Pond two:

Part-way done, Chris and Candy clearing by pulling reeds and cutting tougher ones with shears:

Nearly there:

One clear pond:

Meanwhile, Dave and Rob cleared brambles around the orchard to prevent the fruit trees from becoming smothered:

Once the ponds were done (and feet warmed up) we all spent a little while tidying up the willow-weave tunnel (Trina and Rob here):

Candy and Anthony also re-staked a tree and removed plastic guards from a hedgeline that is now becoming established.

It was a productive day and we have agreed to look at returning in January to do more willow-weaving, clear the next pond, and move (hopefully) dried reeds into a corner of the site where they can compost down.

Dave B

2022.08.11 Nosehill farm – clearance of the Bowl Barrow

Everyone has heard of prehistoric long barrows and round barrows. Bowl barrows are much less conspicuous; they are shaped like inverted saucers. The bowl barrow on a farm in the east of Gloucestershire is one such. Our task was to clear the vegetation growing on and around the edge of the barrow so as to reveal its form and preserve its character.

Four volunteers did an amazing job of clearance using saws, loppers, rakes and a brush cutter. The accompanying ‘Before’ and ‘After’ photos show what a difference we made. We plan to go back in November to finish the task.

“Before” photo

“ After” photo

Dave E

GVCV October 2022 Tidenham Chase Residential –

Heathland restoration work at its best.

On the 9^th / 10^th October 2022, GVCV spent a weekend at Tidenham Chase.

Located just outside Chepstow and a stone’s throw from Offa’s Dyke, Tidenham Chase contains the largest remaining fragment of lowland heathland in Gloucestershire. Gloucester Wildlife Trust, in partnership with Forestry England, manage the site’s heathland restoration project.

The heathland is an important habitat for small birds and some of the UK’s rarest reptiles, including adders. Tidenham is also well known for the wide range of mushrooms found onsite including the distinctive Fly Agaric. The heathland is maintained through conversation grazing and tree clearance.

Over two days a group of 12 from GVCV cleared tree saplings from an area targeted for restoration. As well as being important to habitat management, tree clearance results in large bonfires which were thoroughly enjoyed by the group and bought out the competitive nature in some individuals.

After several hours of enjoyable work in the October sunshine the group also invented a new term ‘doing a Dave’ or ‘dave-ing’ to describe trees that wouldn’t be easily felled.

Staying locally the group enjoyed some social time together in the evenings and got to try out the local Gurkha restaurant – the Woolaston Inn.

Fly Agaric in Tidenham Chase

The group hard at work

Heading back after day 1

Tree mid ‘Dave-ing’

Roger showing how its done 😊

 

GVCV showed that you can mix work and play at Hay Day on Saturday 3^rd September 2022.

In the morning the group helped clear previously cut grass, racking back a limestone meadow to help maintain the low nutrient levels needed to sustain this scares type of habitat. Limestone meadow is a threatened habitat – 50% of the remaining limestone meadow habitat is found within the Cotswolds. Read more here: Wildflower Grassland – Cotswolds National Landscape (cotswoldsaonb.org.uk)

On many tasks we simply dump the cut grass but in this instance the cut grass, crammed full of wild flower seeds, was taken away to an adjacent field to be scattered to hopefully change a plain grass field into another wildflower meadow.

In the spring and summer, the meadow supports six species of orchid (so far), a broad range of butterflies and bats.

Trimming back over hanging tree canopy to increase light around the meadow edges and also the encroaching brambles help maintain this nationally scarce habitat.

Conservation grazing is also used onsite over the winter with the help of a local farmer.

The afternoon was spent enjoying a well earned BBQ next to the meadow so we could enjoying seeing the result of our mornings efforts.

The cows which were let onto the meadow the following morning also seemed pleased with result.

22.08.20 Phil Hermes memorial walk.

Phil Hermes was a volunteer with GVCV from 1989 till 2018 when he died at the early age of 60 after contracting skin cancer and then having a heart attack.

Phil was particularly keen on tasks which required skill, such as dry stone walling and hedge laying.

Phil sharing his encyclopedic knowledge of hedge laying with the “young uns”

He liked to holiday in Greece each summer, carrying out footpath clearance work at Mount Athos.

Phil, from a 1995 GVCV newsletter

In his spare time Phil also liked bird watching on Cleeve Hill, so it is appropriate that his ashes are scattered there and that there is a plaque to his memory around the ‘lone tree’ on top of the hill.

Each year in August, to commemorate Phil’s life we organise a walk up Cleeve Hill to the place where his ashes are scattered. Some friends, family, and ex-work colleagues from European School Books join us conservation volunteers to remember Phil. Afterwards we adjourn to the local pub the Rising Sun for a convivial drink and lunch. This year 2022 it was on Saturday August 20^th.

David G Evans.

GVCV social at the DEYA Brewery Tap

On Thursday 11^th August 2022, GVCV enjoyed an evening out at the new (ish) DEYA brewery tap, conveniently located a short walk from Cheltenham Spa train station.

The group enjoyed a sunny summer evening of interesting beers, Thai food and good company.

Candy

GVCV Task Report – Prestbury Butterfly Reserve

31 July 2022

Seven GVCV volunteers turned out on a changeable and occasionally damp Sunday to clear Willowherb from this butterfly reserve near Cheltenham. 

Roger, Anthony, Vanessa, Chris, Jon, Candy and Dave attended with Landscape Officer Jen Gilbert and Prestbury volunteer and champion cake-maker Serena. 

Willowherb is native but can come to dominate grassland, preventing other plants and wildflowers from growing and reducing the diversity of habitats and food sources required to support a broader range of butterflies.  It is perennial and produces lots of seeds, so can be suppressed by cutting when in flower or progressively eradicated by pulling it out by the roots.

Tools used – ‘dumpy bags’, strimmers, gloves.  Rakes unnecessary.

We took a mixed strategy – avoiding a dense patch where wrens and possibly whitethroats were still nesting – pulling it out in one area and suppressing a further patch we didn’t have time to pull by strimming.  An area around the size of a tennis court was cleared, by keeping doing this year-on-year the amount of willowherb on the reserve can be progressively reduced.

Dense patch with nesting birds left for next time

Hand-pulling the willowherb

Candy’s support truck and machinery

Jen, Chris, Roger and Jon working hard

Jen, Serena, Chris, Vanessa and Jon under a threatening sky

The ‘last ones standing’ when we pulled stumps for the day – Vanessa, Jon, Chris, Candy and Jen

2022.07.03 Kemerton tree popping

On Sunday 3 July 2022, volunteers from GVCV worked again for the Kemerton Conservation Trust, this time in a location new to us within the Kemerton Lake Nature Reserve

The lake is adjacent to an existing extensive arboretum and woodland area and the Trust wish to keep the section around the lake as limestone grass land rather than wooded. Alas this message has not been received by the trees and large numbers of unwanted willow, alder and silver birch saplings have appeared. The larger clumps have been chemically treated but there were numerous single stems or small clumps waiting our attention.

The tool of choice for this task was the tree popper. This is a metal device with a jaw which is locked onto the base of the stem and a long handle enabling the stem to be levered out of the ground, including its roots. This is fairly easy to do where the stem is small and the ground is soft but larger stems in dryer ground require some degree of effort. Swearing at it seems to help.

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There would appear that there are Munt Jac deer on the reserve and we found the remains of one which just didn’t move fast enough

Often we had to hunt through the long grass and weeds to find the offending stems.

The reeds in the pond were 8 or 9 foot tall and were home to a multitude of birds which we could hear, but not see.

Tea break and lunch are essential markers through the day

The grassland already contains an abundance of wild flowers including :

Ragged Robin                                                       King Cup

Bee Orchid                                                           Goats Beard

Columbine

These wild flowers sustain large numbers of butterflies on the site including:

Marbled White

Small tortoiseshell

Meadow Brown

We were fortunate enough to find grass snakes, including some with eggs

We stacked the spoil for others to remove – the height of the heap being the measure of our efforts.

The obligatory group photo at the end of the task (less one early finisher)

2022.05.21 GVCV Social at Nailsworth Festival

On Saturday 21^st May 2022, the Gloucester Vale ‘crew’ made the most of smashing Spring weather to visit the Nailsworth festival and Weighbridge Inn for lunch. The day included a very traditional duck race, live music, locally produced stuff and a good excuse to catch up over a pint. GVCV has socials throughout the year giving us an opportunity to catch up between tasks and visit new places.