curlew © Kev Lewis

Features from Wildlife magazine Wildlife articles 2008 -- Spring 2008 -- ::Severn Barrage ::The Variety of life ::A year at Willsbridge ::Willsbridge comes of age ::Reaching out - Willsbridge ::Round the reserves Wildlife articles 2007 -- Autumn 2007 -- ::Thinking BIG ::Watery webs:the pond network ::Wildlife in the landscape ::Variety of life ::How to be a climate friend ::Seasonal stroll - Walborough ::Round the reserves -- Summer 2007 -- ::The Folly Farm appeal ::Weston Big Wood-biodiversity at its best ::The variety of life ::How to capture a butterfly ::How to get to know an orchid ::Seasonal stroll - WestonBigWood ::Reserves update -- Spring 2007 -- ::Folly Farm - a very special place ::Making a difference at Folly Farm ::How find the magic at Folly Farm ::Seasonal stroll at Folly Farm ::Magic spots at Folly Farm ::Batscapes ::Climate challenge ::Variety of Life - the Ponways project ::Round the reserves Wildlife articles 2006 -- Autumn 2006 -- ::The Severn Estuary ::Bird Watch results ::How to identify garden birds ::Making space for wildlife ::How does your garden grow? ::Round the reserves -- Summer 2006 -- ::Going for green ::Stand up and be counted ::Happy birthday NSLMP ::Holi day - a riot of spring colour ::Avon's species-rich grassland ::How to photograph dragonflies ::The Big Switch ::Round the reserves -- Spring 2006 -- ::How to identify winter water birds ::Make 2006 the year you... ::Invasive invasion ::Sowing the seeds: Willsbridge Mill ::Round the reserves Wildlife articles 2005 -- Autumn 2005 -- ::Indentify common funghi ::Build a hedgehog hideaway ::Big Bird Watch ::Champions for wildlife ::Round the reserves ::Seeds of the futre: Willsbridge Mill -- Summer 2005 -- ::Restoring Folly Farm ::How to become bee-friendly ::How to identify the butterflies of spring ::Save our seas ::The variety of life: hedgerows ::Round the reserves ::25 Ways to make a difference -- Spring 2005 -- ::The variety of life: water voles ::The Avon Biodiversity Action Plan ::How to take really good wildlife photos ::How to help your garden grow ::Round the reserves ::Seasonal strolls: Browns Folly ::Sowing the seeds: for wildlife for people ::Sowing the seeds: looking back

Living Landscapes

Wildlife in the landscape

The benefit to wildlife of working on a landscape scale cannot be better illustrated than looking at these four iconic species, whose chances of healthy recovery have been increased by changed management practices.

Otter
A large fish-eating mammal found in rivers with good quality water the otter is a classic example of a species perfectly designed to survive throughout a wide landscape, where it is able to range over many watery miles to find its food. After a decline during the 1970s and 1980s the otter slowly began to recolonise our area during the late 1990s. Now widespread in our area and found on almost every watercourse, the recovery of this wetland mammal is a sign of good wetland management.

Greater horseshoe bat
Known to feed exclusively on invertebrates that are closely associated with cattle grazing these small, specialised mammals require landscape scale management. Greater horseshoe bats use the network of hedges along field boundaries to navigate their way to a range of widely distributed feeding grounds. Found along the fringes of the Cotswolds and Mendips in South Gloucestershire and North Somerset, this bat prefers a mosaic of hedgerows, small woodlands and cattle grazed fields.

Curlew
A large wading bird that breeds in traditional managed hay meadows where damp soils of wide river valleys allow the bird to probe for soil invertebrates. In our area the curlew is a rare breeder despite populations occurring throughout the Braydon Forest, Somerset Levels and Severn Vale. However with increasing good management practice on a landscape scale it’s hoped that this evocative bird will increase its range into the wide-open landscapes of the North Somerset Moors or into the large river valley of the Severn Vale of South Gloucestershire.

Marsh fritillary
This beautiful butterfly is one of the UK’s most vulnerable insect species. Dependent on an abundance of devil’s-bit scabious (the caterpillar’s food plant), populations of this butterfly range over wide landscape areas enabling it to exploit the right conditions that it requires. This boom-and-bust lifestyle means that the marsh fritillary can become locally extinct as it leapfrogs around the countryside from year to year, often thriving for a few years before disappearing, only to turn up somewhere else. In our area there is a widespread (but very local) population along the Mendips where clay soils enable devil’s-bit scabious to survive in traditional pastures. However, similar sites in Gordano remain uncolonised as
the butterfly seems unable to reach so far away from traditional haunts.

Severn wonders

One of our most dramatic local wildlife corridors has to be the Severn Estuary. Wild and exposed, open to the elements, it can sometimes appear a rather hostile environment for us humans but its location on the north Atlantic flyway for migratory birds means that its mudflats and saltmarshes are of vital importance
for wildfowl.

Curlew feed on lugworms buried deep in the mud using their long bill, while shelduck sift through surface water to extract tiny snails. At peak times it is one of only a half dozen Bristish estuaries to hold more than 100,000 waterfowl’.

South Gloucestershire Council has been running the Severn Wonders Project to encourage local people to visit the estuary and find out why it is such a special place for wildlife. As part of this project the Trust has been working with three local primary schools, taking the children down to the waters edge at Severn Beach, and exploring this wildlife-rich environment. Helen Adshead, the Trust’s Environmental Interpretation Officer, was at the heart of the action.

“At first sight the children dismissed their beach as a load of mud! But they soon came to realise that the mud was a fantastic resource, both for wildlife and for themselves. Welooked in the mud and found tracks and trails from the countless tiny creatures which have colonised this habitat. “Another trail! I’ve found another snail!” went up the enthusiastic cry, and many pairs of brown-coated wellie boots would splosh over to take a look. The children were fascinated by the tiny creatures and the abundance of them in the mud.

With such a dense presence of edible bait they quickly realised why the Severn Estuary is so important for birds, and spent a lot of time getting to grips with binoculars and the telescope, trying to identify which birds were in sight and what they were doing. We followed bird footprints across the mud and saw bird beak prints – evidence of busy feeding times. We investigated which plants could grow in the harsh conditions down on the mud flats, and with help from ecologist Rupert Higgins learned how the plants had adapted to the salt and water, wind and sun. On one particular day the weather was so cold and the wind so strong that we had to huddle together to keep warm, and began to feel what it must be like to be penguins huddling together on the ice!

The mud also gave great pleasure and scope for the children’s creativity. We drew in it and with it and recorded the sounds of pebbles dropping in the mud. Each class took a bucket of mud back to school with them and used it to print banners, illustrating the variety of wildlife they had seen and heard.

One of the children said to me “this is the best school trip I have ever been on!” and teacher added “It was invaluable out of classroom experience.” It sounds as though we were successful in our aim to engage the local people ... but to be fair, I think the water and the mud and the creatures and the pebbles and the sheer magic of the place did the trick – it certainly did it for me!”