* * * NEWS * * *

** Finally have a (broad) topic for my dissertation! ** Undertook small mammal trapping and saw my first vole! ** Two assignments down... 4 big ones to go. ** Great Crested Newt bottle traps created ** Hanningfield Living Landscape sections drafted ** Chelmsford becomes a city! ** College prize draw win **

As you can see - I've been busy.  So has the Queen.  Let's start with that shall we?  Chelmsford has become the first city in Essex.  I had no idea that we had no other cities - read what the BBC had to say about it here.  Well done Chelmsford.  I hope Lizzy had a lovely time when she went to do her recce.

Onto far more important news.  After much deliberation I have finally settled on a topic for my dissertation and yes, I have gone full-circle and am doing a study of c.4 generalist butterfly species in an arable landscape and the affects that climate change and microclimate and land-use change has on them in terms of their plasticity.  All with a view to predicting what these changes (climatic and land-use) might mean for other generalist and specialist species over the coming decades.  Or something like that!  I am very excited about it.  There's still a lot to do in terms of the scope of the research but it is still early days.  It will be a lot of hard work but I can't wait to get started.

First though, 4 chunky assignments to get through - habitat management essay; landscape character assessment; biological surveying report and the research proposal for the aforementioned butterfly project.

As part of our couse we did some small mammal trapping last week. We set several Longworth traps along a boundary hedge in an arable setting. We only found two species Wood Mouse (Apodemus sylvaticus) and Bank Vole (Myodes glareolus) but it was useful to get practice of constructing the traps, filling them, placing them in suitable positions, and then checking them. We also got practice of handling them and sexing them. Having owned a pair of dwarf hamsters fairly recently I wasn't too worried about handling them. However, these little critters are tiny and wriggly! It was a great experience though. Pictures following below:

Bank vole

Congratulations! It's a girl!

Wood Mouse

It has been quite a hands-on month at college.  A small group of us, trying to get our Great Crested Newt licence this year, set about creating bottle traps.  It was a lovely hour of arts and crafts as we cut up plastic bottles and then reassembled them "kebab-style" on a garden cane.  We put them out overnight at the edge of the college reservoir.  It was a bit early/cold and so they remained empty in the morning when they were checked.

The sections Michelle and I were writing for the Hanningfield Living Landscape vision document have been done and submitted.  We attended an indicator team meeting this week and it all seems to be progressing on time.  The draft document is due for internal review next week and then we'll take it from there.  Despite our section being completed it is good experience for us to stay involved to see how it all gets put together.  Hopefully we will be able to get involved in the summer in planning the projects that arise from the vision document.

And finally (no, I'm not one of the Two Ronnies) my name was drawn out of a hat as the winner of the college library survey prize draw.  Book token prize.  Niiice.

I think that is it for now.  Back to the essay writing.

I love Twitter

Chris Packham replied to one of my tweets.  See for yourself.  Speechless, I was.

Nuclear Nature

At the mouth of the River Blackwater at the northern tip of the Dengie Peninsula in Essex lies the defuelled Bradwell Nuclear Power Station.  It operated for about 40 years but was decommissioned 10 years ago.  Some months ago I pulled a wildlife walk guide from a magazine and stuck it on my shelf thinking 'I'll do that walk sometime'.  Well, Sunday was the day.  We drove up to Bradwell-on-Sea which is a beautiful little village, with some ridiculously friendly residents, and parked the car in the designated car park near the chapel of St. Peter-on-the-Wall.  This restored chapel dates back to 654 (http://www.bradwellchapel.org/) and it is a lovely little place - always open as well so you can go inside for a look around and to get out of the wind off the North Sea!

St. Peter's-on-the-Wall

The circular walk takes you right round the sea wall of the peninsula and permits great views of a range of song birds near the bird observatory (run by Essex Birdwatching Society) and the chapel and then waders and wildfowl on the saltmarsh and fields.  As we were walking round we saw a huge flock of birds flying in over the sea wall.  they just seemed to grow and grow in number and then landed in an arable field to feed and rest.  They were Brent Geese and there were thousands of them.



Brent Geese



We saw lots of other species of bird but the highlight for me was spotting a common seal just offshore who was looking as us just as intently as we were looking at it.  We also saw a couple of hare in the fields on the walk back to the car park.

The species list for the day: Wren; Chaffinch; Skylark; Bombus spp.; Magpie; Reed Bunting; Great Tit; Blue Tit; Greenfinch; Shelduck; Knot; Brent Goose; Oystercatcher; Little Egret; Redshank; Common Seal; Black-headed Gull; Great Spotted Woodpecker; Green Woodpecker; Mallard; House Sparrow; Rook; Wood Pigeon; Carrion Crow; Robin, Blackbird; Rabbit; Fieldfare; Pheasant; Hare and Moorhen.

Bradwell Power Station

It was a lovely sunny day and a very long walk.  With all the stopping and starting it took us about 4 and a half hours to walk round but I would definitely recommend it.  It was great to be by the sea and seeing the sun setting was really beautiful.

Sunset over the River Blackwater

Busy busy busy...

It's been an incredibly busy month or so and my poor blog has suffered.  January saw me take the reigns of the Essex Field Club's "A Wildlife Diary" in their newsletter.  First article to appear in April. 

My statistics exam has been and gone - I passed!

I had a wonderful trip down to Dorset with EuCAN again where we (Amy and I) spent a great weekend in Beech Cottage hanging out at the Kingcombe Centre with Nigel, Kathy, Sarah et al.  We did some winter twig ID and looed at bryophytes, learnt about traditional hay making in Transylvania, enjoyed a barn dance (with cider and wine), lots of fabulous food and cake, and then spent Sunday morning clearing gorse and hawthorn on a Butterfly Conservation site at Lankham Bottom.

I've been out and about at Langdon again and this weekend we had a work party from Butterfly Conservation join us to continue in our pursuit of the perfect habitat for the Grizzled Skipper.  Not sure whether they are going to "move in" but we can hope.

The deadline is looming for the Hanningfield Living Landscape information to be written and submitted for review, so once this current assignment is completed that is next on the list.

Oh, and we had 15cm of snow in Basildon at the start of the month.  Great fun!!

Gloucester Park, Basildon

Cormorant drying off

Mute Swan

Dissertation topic...

In the next few weeks I really need to decide on a broad topic for my dissertation.  I'm due to present some ideas about it to a panel at college sometime in February and then my completed research proposal has to be submitted by the beginning of May, ready to commence the real work from then until Spring 2013....

Slight problem: I haven't got a clue what to choose!  So I'm calling for as many suggestions as possible whether it be mammals, birds, butterflies, bats, plants, trees, habitats, landscape ecology.... I just need rough ideas to see what ones might enable me to produce a compelling dissertation!

Answers on a postcard please.... :-)

Happy New Year!

A very happy new year to my handful of readers!  Spring seems just around the corner and I can't wait as I got my very first bat detector for Christmas and I want to get out there and use it.

Christmas was spent in Scotland visiting my folks and I was desperate to get out and about, but sadly, the weather was atrocious and I just didn't have the right clothing with me.  The journey up the M74 was quite exciting as we saw several buzzards in Dumfries and Galloway which I'd never noticed before - mainly because we normally drive up in the dark!  So, a walk around Coombe Wood in Langdon Hills was the order of the day on New Year's Eve once we were back in Essex.  It was a really nice walk with views over the Thames Estuary.  We saw a few Great Spotted Woodpeckers and some Great Tits, but nothing much else.  There were some lovely trees though some great gnarly ones.

So until my next installment... here's to a conservation-tastic 2012!

Betty, Boar, Beavers, Birds and much, much more

Mid-November sees a break in lectures and this year the college laid on three field trips for those of us who were interested. 

Monday was a visit to the Wildwood Trust in Kent to learn more about their captive breeding programmes.  In particular their water vole programme.  Water vole populations have declined over the years mainly die to loss of habitat and the alien species American Mink.  The Trust often takes in voles which are part of a translocation programme.  Depending on the length of time they are going to be in captivity they will breed from the animals to ensure their survival.  As such it is often the grandchildren of the original animals which are released into the wild.  In 2011 they bred approximately 270 voles there.  We met "Betty" who was the first water vole I have ever seen in the "fur".  We also had a wander round all the cages.  It seems to be a very labour intensive process looking after all these voles but a worthwhile project to ensure their survival.  The girl pictured with "Betty" is a Writtle graduate currently carrying out an internship with the Trust.

Introducing "Betty"



One of the many enclosures housing the voles



Following the voles, we were then guided round the rest of the park by a couple of members of the educational team.  We were shown some small mammals such as pine marten but then moved on to the boar.  it was interesting to see the effect they have on the ground in their enclosure as this would be what it would be like if they were released into the wild.  Although they make a mess of the ground with their trampling and snuffling the disturbance can be good for many species.  The one species it is not good for is the bluebell.  The UK's bluebell woods are the finest examples in the world and boar in the wild could have a catastrophic impact on this.

"Harriet" the wild boar

We also saw bison, wolves, lynx, Konik horses and some sleeping beavers.  The red squirrels were adorable but they don't seem to do very well in captivity showing signs of stereotypies.  This is where the animal behaves in a repetitive or habitual way, such as pacing along the enclosure boundary. 

Konik Horse - another fashionable conservation tool

European bison

Wildwood Trust

One of the red squirrels

After lunch we drove to a Kent Wildlife Trust site called Ham Fen where they have released beavers into a secured area for conservation purposes.  Surrounded by an electric fence the fen is exceptionally boggy, as you would expect, and there were obvious signs of beaver activity with some felled trees and some well-nibbled ones.

Further along the river we encountered exceptionally wet ground and in fact I ended up thigh-deep in a badger burrow.  Covered in mud and with walking boots full of water I marched on (carefully) to see the beaver lodge and their dam.  An impressive construction built in about a fortnight. They are truly amazing animals in terms of their engineering ability.

On Tuesday we headed out to the Dengie Peninsula (a Special Protection Area and an Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty); a place which inspired films such as War of the Worlds and The Birds due to it's other-worldly, bleak appearance, and somewhere I've wanted to go for some time.  We were here to start the Big Birding Bash and we went to a few different sites including arable, coastal and estuarine.  Our list of spots (few of which were identified by me!) included:

• Corn Bunting
• Chaffinch
• Goldfinch
• Carrion Crow
• Hooded Crow
• Magpie
• Skylark
• Reed Bunting
• Yellowhammer
• Brent Goose
• Oystercatcher
• Redshank
• Turnstone
• Marsh Harrier
• Little Egret
• Dunlin
• Shelduck
• Curlew
• Golden Plover
• Lapwing
• Mistle Thrush
• Little Owl (the most exciting for me!!)

Waiting for the owls to show... with some very eerie trees!

Friday was the last day of the field trip programme and we headed off to Hertfordshire to attend a few talks by staff at Rothamsted Research.  Having put a career in research into the melting pot of future ideas I was excited to be going there to find out what it was all about.  The place felt very "sciencey" in an old-fashioned kind of way and these people really know what they are talking about.  Specialists in aphids, bumblebees and long-term research projects it was fascinating to hear them talk.  The focus is very much agricultural research; increasing productivity whilst developing environmentally sustainable solutions.

A trip to the ladies took me back a couple of decades to my Grandma's house when I spotted a little toilet roll doll on top of the hand dryer: fabulous.  The staff canteen was pretty fantastic as well.  Looks like a good place to work overall!

An excellent week of interesting field trips topped off by having to hand in 3 assignments in quick succession.  Perhaps I should have stayed home to concentrate on those - only time will tell!  I'm happy to trade a few marks for a sighting of a Little Owl.