OUR AIM IS TO PROTECT OUR NATURAL ENVIRONMENT AND THE HABITAT IT PROVIDES FOR WILDLIFE ALONG THE RIVERSIDE
To find Nature Notes and records for wildlife here - click on
Our meet on Sunday 25th September 2016 started under cloudy skies after early rain, enough to increase the river level and flow for a short while but not enough to soak into the dry ground under the trees. The clouds soon moved off and it became very warm in the sun. Shade brambles were full of blackberries, larger than those produced by brambles exposed to the summer sun where berries quickly dried up. These were quickly pounced upon by blackbirds which could be detected working their way through the deep undergrowth inside bramble patches, rustling vegetation and giving quiet calls. Now, these autumn berries are providing food for many more creatures along the river, the sugars attracting insects, including late butterflies, small mammals and most birds. Seed-eaters are provided with a huge choice and will leave seeding blackberries for later, when food is scarce, and the ground under snow. Then larger birds will land on and shake off snow covering brambles to reveal blackberries gone to seed - but still a good source of food, together with seeding Dock, left standing - a feast for goldfinches, linnets and many others searching the bare winter landscape.
LIFELINE
Recent years and months have seen a huge reduction in species-rich hedgerows that used to sustain many thousands of birds and small mammals in the surrounding countryside. Now we have a serious task in protecting existing habitat and creating more diversity in order to sustain wildlife. Replacing habitat, like for like, is scheduled to take place but will take time - meanwhile the river course, with its string of new drainage basins and ponds becomes a lifeline, literally, for all species of displaced and resident wildlife and can attract new species too.
Be watchful and vigilant...
