Wild About Gwent April 2012.pdf - Gwent Wildlife Trust

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NEWS IN BRIEF Beacon Hill (Gabi Horup) GWT Chepstow Local Group Needs You! After another successful season of attending various events and putting on plant sales, the Chepstow Group raised £1,415 in 2011. The money raised is already going to some much needed maintenance and improvements at the Magor Marsh Reserve. A new bridge has been erected, an orchard planted, and other useful work is under way. The bad news is that their hard-working gazebo has sustained an injury and will not be able to provide them with shade and shelter for this year’s plant sales. If anyone has a three metre square pop-up gazebo which they no longer need, or even sees one at a really good price, please give Hilary Lee a ring on 01291 689326. They’re also looking for some new trainee face painters! Face painting is such a popular attraction for open days and is a marvellous way of raising funds while giving us time to chat to families. If you would like to be an artist and make children happy at the same time, please contact Hilary or the GWT office on 01600 740600. GWT Usk Local Group Also Excels And not to be outdone, members of the GWT Usk Local Group have recently raised £1000. The money will be used for much needed fencing at Silent Valley and bridges at Magor Marsh. Nurturing Monmouthshire’s Natural Assets Rebecca Price – Project Officer GWT’s latest project, supporting some of our best places for wildlife (what we officially call Local Wildlife Sites or LWS), has attracted much interest since it began last summer. The Monmouthshire Natural Assets Project, a collaborative effort with Monmouthshire County Council, is working to restore, maintain and add value to the county’s Local Wildlife Sites. The project is able to offer wildlife and management advice to LWS owners and managers, along with grants of up to £2,000 to help with capital works projects supporting restoration and site enhancement. The first grant panel meeting awarded a total of almost £8,000 to six Local Wildlife Sites, with a further £10,000 provisionally awarded to a further seven sites at the last panel meeting. The grant money will contribute significantly to the conservation and enhancement of these high-value nature sites. A number of the projects have been for fencing to enable wildflower-rich grassland to be sensitively grazed. Wildflower-rich grasslands depend on careful management through hay cutting and grazing. Without proper care, wildflower diversity declines and these sites can be lost to encroaching scrub or invasive species. Hedgelaying works at Stevenstone Meadow LWS (Rebecca Price) With the help of a seasonal surveyor, we’ll also be identifying new Local Wildlife Sites. To date, GWT and Monmouthshire Meadows Group survey efforts have focused on identifying species-rich grasslands, but we’ll also be looking to assess other habitat types over the next two years. If you have land which you think may be of LWS quality and would like a survey or habitat management advice, please do contact me at rprice@gwentwildlife. org or for more information, go to www. gwentwildlife.org/mon_nat_assets.htm. The project is one of a suite of projects supported under Axis 3 of the Monmouthshire Rural Development Plan funded by the Welsh Government and the European Agricultural Fund for Rural Development. We’re also grateful to the Countryside Council for Wales (CCW) who also provides funding for the project. Common blue butterfly (Amy Lewis) GWENT WILDLIFE TRUST x WILD ABOUT GWENT
Coppicing at Magor Marsh NEWS IN BRIEF Shrill Carder Bee (Gabi Horup) School orchard planting (Kerry Schartz) School Orchards Alice Rees – Gwent Orchards Project Officer We all know how wonderful orchards are. They are biodiversity hotspots and an example of a traditional agricultural practice which forms a distinct part of our heritage. It is not surprising, then, that the importance of orchards is being recognised more and more as an irreplaceable learning resource for our school children. The Gwent Orchards Project was awarded funding from the Wye Valley AONB Sustainable Development Fund this year to plant orchards with primary schools in the Monmouthshire part of the AONB (Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty). Orchards were planted at Trellech and Llandogo Primary schools this January, which meant Alice Rees, Gwent Orchards Project Officer, along with the help of Gabrielle Horup, Conservation Officer, and Nicola Stone, Assistant Conservation Officer, got their hands dirty with some very excitable groups of school children! Five fruit trees were planted at each school, three apples, a pear and a plum. Varieties were chosen for their disease resistance and fruit production. “It was extremely important to choose trees which would fruit during the school year”, said Alice, “which meant that we were not able to plant heritage varieties. However at least we know the trees require minimal care and that the children can enjoy watching the fruit grow, and eating it afterwards!”. The orchards will provide an important outdoor classroom for the children to learn from in years to come. Wildlife will be attracted to the blossom and fruit, helping increase the children’s knowledge of the natural world around them. Understanding where our food comes from can also be taught. We hope enough fruit will be available eventually, to enable the teachers and children to juice it and even sell it at school events. Thank you to everyone at Trellech and Llandogo for all your enthusiasm and help with the orchards! Winter bird feeding sites GWT worked with five local authorities across Gwent to produce a network of winter bird feeding sites last year. If you have a spare corner of land where you would like to create a feeding site, then please download our new leaflet from www.gwentwildlife.org for some useful hints and tips! Shrill Carder Bee Project takes Flight The Gwent Levels are a stronghold for the shrill carder bee, a bumblebee on the verge of extinction and in need of urgent conservation. GWT has developed a two-year project which will increase awareness of this rare bee and its habitat in Gwent. We are hoping to expand its range around the levels by working with area landowners to provide wildflower-rich habitats. The project, working in coordination with the Bumblebee Conservation Trust, will enlist volunteers to monitor the bees and their habitats. If you would like to know more about the project, or become a volunteer, please contact Rebecca Price on rprice@gwentwildlife.org or call her on 01600 740600. Shrill Carder Bee Project Area April 2012
Page 1 and 2: Gwent Wildlife Trust Ymddiriedolaet
Page 3 and 4: NEWS IN BRIEF Wasp spider (Steve Da
Page 5 and 6: Lauri tackles one of her team (Anne
Page 7 and 8: Summer Fun Day at Magor Marsh Hosts
Page 9: NEWS IN BRIEF Waxwing (Margaret Hol

Wild About Gwent April 2012.pdf - Gwent Wildlife Trust

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