Wild Life Crime

From:

Roger Dickey | Chairman Heart of the Level Group | 441458 273753 | 447973534282 | roger@dickey4444.freeserve.co.uk

Dear SWT Heart of the Levels supporter.

 

Our next talk is this coming Tuesday 14th March. Once again we gone for something a little different.

 

The subject that is very often overlooked, as crime statistics are mentioned, is wildlife crime – we all have our own views on what this means but it is a topic rarely reported in the Press unless it involves certain protected species, and even then hardly credits a mention. What actually is a wildlife crime, how much crime is there and is there anything we can do to help prevent it or indeed report it?

 

We are very fortunate to have Dave Pepper coming to speak to us on Tuesday, not only because he is a local police officer, but also because there are only a few Wildlife Crimes Officers in the county making him a bit of a rare breed.

 

I do hope to see you in the Parish Rooms at 7:30 pm for this talk with a difference.

 

Cheers

 

Roger

 

Nightingale update. Luscinia megarhynchos

Our night time walk was very successful and a rewarding experience. I was joined by one other neighbour and we easily located the singing bird at around 11 pm in the top branches of an old overgrown hedge, mainly Blackthorn.We didn't try to see it directly but it didn't take any notice of us within about 10 metres  away. It was singing again last night at midnight. Other local reports say it was first heard last thursday , 16th April.

Here is  some information from the RSPB web site. Next question: where did this bird spend the winter?


It seems that in the middle of Somerset we are on the normal western end of their summer visits.


Luscinia megarhynchos

Where to see them

A secretive bird which likes nothing better than hiding in the middle of an impenetrable bush or thicket. In the UK they breed mostly south of the Severn-Wash line and east from Dorset to Kent. The highest densities are found in the south east: Essex, Suffolk, Norfolk, Kent and Sussex.

When to see them

They arrive in April and sing until late May and early June. They leave again from July to September. They can be heard singing throughout the day, as well as at night.

What they eat

Insects

Population

Europe	UK breeding*	UK wintering*	UK passage*
-	6,700 males	-	-

* UK breeding is the number of pairs breeding annually. UK wintering is the number of individuals present from October to March. UK passage is the number of individuals passing through on migration in spring and/or autumn.

Bat enquiries, questions, conservation.

When I check the stats provided for my Blog the subject of Bats comes up as a top ten reason for visits,
Especially people searching with Google. I'm not well informed on the subject so a good way to help local residents in Somerset is to suggest they visit the specialist Group shown below.

Use this link to visit:   

I recommend anyone interested in Bats to join their Bat Group
Lou is also the Chair of the SWT Yeovil Area Group

Somerset Bat Group

Home

Events

Links

Somerset Bat Group was formed in 1985 to help protect bats in Somerset
We are affiliated to the Bat Conservation Trust (the national organisation for bat protection) and Somerset Wildlife Trust

Somerset has 15 of the 16 species of British Bats and we still haven’t given up on the 16th. Some species are more common than others and some are endangered. The Bat Group is actively engaged in varied activities to help preserve these fascinating creatures.

Several of our members run Bat Walks in the Summer. We give talks to local groups, install and check bat boxes and during the Winter hold workshops and courses in Bat Care, Analysing Bat Sound, and Bat Identification.

If you are interested in joining us the please contact secretary Lou Pickersgill, 
phone 01935 862468, or send £5 subs to Lou at 3 Odcombe Hollow, East Chinnock, Yeovil, Somerset BA22 9DW.

© Somerset Bat Group 2009: Bechstein's Bat photo © Paul Kennedy

Local Wildlife Group Five years old!

Sent this brief report off for publication in our Somerset Wildlife Trust magazine. You can read it first here. World scoop!!   There is a 200 word limit on what we can say which is why it is so short!

The Heart of the Levels Group has just celebrated the fifth anniversary of starting our Group.

Five years into a new venture is a good point at which to look back on what we have achieved as a small group of volunteers.

Here are some of my personal highlights.

A talk by Chris Sperring accompanied by live owls was special.

Our one day workshops on Art and Wildlife and recently on Wild Flower

Photography were a great learning experience.

The setting up of our Botany Study Group with the professional help of Dr Anne Bebbington and John Bebbington.

Learning about nature has been inherent in all our activities. Starting a local Wildlife Watch Club was another big step forward.

Funds raised through our activities enable us to make a contribution to SWT Appeals and to support our Watch Club.

We submitted comments to DEFRA on Badgers and the Natural Environment.

We are currently writing a short guide to our local reserves.

Helping SWT set up a new reserves working group for the East Polden Hills is in progress.

Writing a natural history Blog on our activities and environmental issues.

Starting our local group was the best way to learn about wildlife.

Somerset Wildlife Trust AGM

The Trusts AGM is on October 16th.
Guest speaker will be Nick Baker, well known wildlife TV presenter.
Try this link to a video showing Nick in action.

Annual Report of the Heart of the Levels Area Group

Heart of the Levels Group of the Somerset Wildlife Trust.

Chairman’s annual report
10.10.09

This report covers:

• Some of the successful events of the last year.
• The work of the committee and its members.
• Looks forward over the next 12 months.

I am very much aware of the strong support our committee gives whilst helping to support our aims and objectives. Our committee has met 8 times since last September.

Our finances have benefited from careful attention by our Treasurer, for which we are grateful. At the end of Sept we had £749.09 in our local account.

We had gained two new committee members in 2008 but lost one this year due to other commitments. We would welcome at least two more members.

May 19th 2006 was our inaugural meeting but we started setting up our group at the end of 2005 and so we are now four years old.

The Wildlife Trust has settled down some what since the major upheavals in 2008 caused by economic issues and new staff have been settling in through out 2009.

The most significant event has been the start of a new Botany Group based in Langport. SWT members have signed up for a series of monthly classes in basic botany. Proposed and led by Dr Anne Bebbington with the help of John Bebbington it is hoped that it will give members a chance to improve their plant identification skills and possibly lead to an active group able to carry out botanical surveys.

We have organised or supported 13 events in our area. We have six events organised through to April 2010. We have a new programme card which we can make available.

We visited Aller Woods for a fungi foray and a spring woodland flower walk.

We have an email newsletter. Please let us know if you would like a copy.

We made two donations from our funds to the Trusts appeals for work at Westhay and to maintain bluebell woods in general. There are three new small appeals being promoted by the SWT which we will consider shortly.

In advance of the next election, should we hold a meeting to ask our prospective MP’s for their views on important topics. Would you like us to do that?

We are promoting our Arts and Wildlife Workshops in the next edition of the SWT News magazine and depending on the response we will either continue them on a regular basis or perhaps revert to an annual event.

SWT set up two new committees or Forums to enable staff to discuss with members some of the important areas of the Trusts work. 1) The Living Landscape Committee (LCC) this is a major part of the Trusts work load. 2) The Campaigns, Community and Education Committee (CCE) As Chair of our group I attend the CCE meetings about every 3 months or so.

The Trust has also given new support to the Private Nature Reserve Network (PNRN).
It was set up in1996 to help land owners who wanted to encourage wildlife and has around 200 members at present responsible for a total of 355 hectares in all parts of Somerset.

We supported the educational work of the Kingfisher Project which allowed around 250 primary school children from 8 schools, mainly in our area to get first hand experience of wildlife during visits to a wild flower meadow on a farm in Curry Rivel. We would like to see a Watch Group set up in this area.

I expect our activities for the next 12 months will include:

• Organise about 6 indoor meetings through the winter using venues in Curry Rivel , Langport and Somerton.
• Arrange some visits to reserves during the summer months.
• Encourage members to offer to help out with running our meetings and on reserves with practical tasks.
• Get better at communicating with members especially new members so as to make sure we are putting on talks and events which members find interesting.
• Encourage members to get to know our local reserves.
• Respond to wildlife related enquiries put to us by members and even if we don’t know the answer we will find someone who does! Use the Open University web site, iSpot.
• Support the Wildlife Trust in its work wherever we can with our limited resources through positive and constructive comment and fund raising.


*********************************************************************

Contacts.


Telephone: David German by email: levelswildlife@btinternet.com
Web site: http:// heartofthelevels.blogspot.com

Details of the SWT and other specialist groups are in the Trusts magazine.

Anyone wanting to read more about our activities will find a lot of information on the SWT web site and our Blog: http:// heartofthelevels.blogspot.com

Wildflower meadow campaign

I took this photo in a local wildflower meadow. I think this is a Field Scabious being mobbed by Six Spot Burnet moths. It shows clearly just what we will lose if we don't protect our local meadows.



You might find it of interest to see what we offer for inclusion in the next issue of our Somerset Wildlife Trust magazine which is issued three times a year.

Heart of the Levels Group.

Last time I wrote: Our local Council is to be congratulated on agreeing to keep part of a wildflower meadow as a nature reserve. It turned out I was too optimistic and now it is not clear how it will look after this local County Wildlife Site.

We have 18 Parishes in our area and we would encourage all members to take an interest in how their own Council meets its responsibilities to protect wildlife and biodiversity. The County Council and District Councils can give plenty of advice if asked. Our 500 local members can make a difference.

At our last public meeting we were treated to a wonderful presentation of photographs of moths and butterflies and the fascinating range of caterpillars which exist everywhere but usually escape our notice. John Bebbington, Secretary of the Somerset Moth Group and a Fellow of the Royal Photographic Society combined detailed photography with his extensive technical knowledge.

Offers of help in running our group are always welcome, that includes acting as our eyes and ears!

West Somerset Area Group March Newsletter

Before you start reading , here is a photo of some of the volunteers who are running the Somerset Wildlife Trust Area Groups. Between them they cover most of this very large county from Exmoor to the Mendip Hills

I've just been reading the latest newsletter from the West Somerset Area Group. (I should have been writing up our own newsletter but this one proved very readable). They operate much as we do except they have been going a bit longer than us and perhaps because of their years of experience they are very well established. Here is an extract.

West Somerset Area Group

NEWSLETTER

March 2008

THE MONTH AT A GLANCE

Monday 3^rd – Area Group Committee Meeting

Thursday 6^th Climate Change Meeting 7 – 9 p.m.

Friday 7^th – WSCV Hopcott Common Project

Saturday 8^th – WATCH Group Meeting 10.00 a.m. at Nettlecombe Court

Tuesday 11^th – Bovine TB 7.30 p.m. Taunton Library

Monday 17^th – Area Group Committee Meeting

Friday 21^st – WSCV Hopcott Common Project

Thursday 27^th – 7.00 for 7.30; Two Woozles and a Wizzle

WATCH Group

On Saturday 1^st February Janet and I attended the WATCH Group Meeting at Nettlecombe Court. It was a rather noisy morning as the youngsters were building nest boxes which they then erected in the grounds. It was good to see youngsters enjoying themselves constructively and we hope to see the WATCH Group go from strength to strength.

The next meeting is on Saturday 8 March when they will have a look to see what is using their nest boxes and whether there any eggs; plus an eggstravanza of other Easter Eggy sorts of fun and games. Just the sort of thing to take the grandchildren to.

Minehead RNLI & Porlock Coastguard save deer off Culvercliffe

Following a call from a member of the public HM Coastguard requested Minehead's new Atlantic 85 Lifeboat launch at 12.00 hrs with volunteer helmsman Adam Bonar in command. The crew arrived on scene just off Culvercliffe and quickly spotted a young deer about 100 meters off shore. It was evident that the animal was extremely tired and distressed so a decision was made to "coax" it back to shore where a team from Porlock HM Coastguard was waiting.

As soon as the deer got back on dry land it immediately returned to the water where the Lifeboat crew again tried to encourage it to go ashore. On this second attempt the startled animal made for some bushes just off the beach where it stayed for a considerable time.

After struggling to catch the animal it made a third attempt to swim away when the Lifeboat managed to get alongside and recover it and secure it for the short journey back to Minehead Lifeboat Station.

The animal stayed onboard until the Lifeboat was recovered before being checked over by a local vet. Once confident that the deer was in good health, albeit wet and tired the crew took it to North Hill and released it.

Volunteer Helmsman Adam Bonar commented "we get called to a wide range of incidents but this was one of the more unusual. The deer proved quite tricky to recover and didn't seem overly appreciative of its trip in a Lifeboat".

Source: Minehead RNLI website

WSCV Hopcott Common Work Days

On the 8^th February we were blessed with glorious weather. The clear visibility across Minehead and up and over the Channel gave a brilliant backdrop to our labours and we were delighted by little flocks of Crossbills and Siskin amongst many other birds. It’s a while since we have seen any deer whilst working but they leave their evidence everywhere.

On the 22nd the weather wasn’t bad either. We were visited by Patrick Watts-Mabbott the Exmoor National Park Authority officer responsible for volunteer activity, amongst many other roles. He was accompanied by a colleague from ENPA and two representatives of the British Trust for Conservation Volunteers, who seemed impressed with what we were doing, and more importantly the way we were doing it.

The purpose of the visit was to check on the suitability of our project for a visit by some youngsters who have to shoulder responsibility for looking after an infirm or disabled relative. The Wildlife Trust, BTCV and the National Park have all individually agreed to lay on fun/respite days for these very deserving and often overlooked youngsters and it so happens that all three organisations come together on Hopcott Common.

Banish the Bags

I was pleased to see the Daily Mail's new 'Banish the Bags' campaign, in an effort to rid the UK of plastic bag litter - see the Mail's website for details, which includes lots of advice, statistics and images provided by the Marine Conservation Society (MCS). You can also read more about plastic litter on the MCS Adopt-a-Beach website.

Otter Monitoring

A number of members are involved locally in monitoring our resident otters on behalf of Somerset Otter Group. All seems to be well with the population very stable which means we probably have just about the optimum number of otters in West Somerset. As a rough yardstick one can say there is an otter for every 5 miles or so of ‘fishable water’ – but what you might think of as fishable and what an otter can find food in are very different things. Quite large eels can be found in very small rills for example; and at this time of year an otter will take frogs as well as fish.

Committee Matters

At their Meeting on Monday 3 March your Committee started to look at the implications of likely shortfalls in funding resulting from changing Government policy towards the allocation of Heritage Lottery cash and grants for environmental work.

In future it would seem that the Wildlife Trusts will have to rely more and more on their members to provide volunteers to carry out tasks heretofore performed by paid staff. Here in West Somerset we are fortunate in already having our highly skilled, multi talented, super-fit, motivated and eager team of Conservation Volunteers who have demonstrated their ability to perform miracles in exchange for a burned sausage; but we are going to need more people willing to have ago at a multitude of interesting projects.

Our Programmes Sub-Committee has already been looking at ways of bringing our programme closer to the membership – not easy in an Area that is 43 miles long by around 10 miles wide on average. You will notice changes in the months ahead as the new ideas start to kick in – it will be some time ahead as events are planned and speakers etc. booked well in advance.

We also need to take our displays to more events across and around the Area and anyone willing to have a go at staffing these at a fete or fair or show in your own local community please let me know.

That’s all for now, folks.

Happy wildlife watching!