• Abstract and Figures
• Public Full-text

© TERRY WHITTAKER TERRY © Spring 2019 NEWS FROM YOUR LOCAL WILDLIFE TRUST AND FROM AROUND THE UK Brilliant beetles Trevor James picks his six-legged fab four 24 Saturday 27 and Sunday 28 July 10:00am-4:00pm Panshanger Park Join us for a FREE family festival at the beautiful Panshanger Park for a weekend of walks, talks and conservation activities to celebrate the wildlife of Hertfordshire and Middlesex. >> RESERVE >> STARS OF Find out more at: EXTENDED THE NIGHT hertswildlifetrust.org.uk/festival Frogmore Meadows Discover our In partnership with triples in size 5 secretive bats 10 PROTECTING WILDLIFE FOR THE FUTURE Spring 2019 Everything for wildlife, contents ecology and conservation NEWS FROM YOUR LOCAL WILDLIFE TRUST AND FROM AROUND THE UK Bat detectors CONSERVATION Camera traps & accessories 4 Quack-nav Moth traps & insect nets A new project aims to shed light on the movement of waterfowl. 1000s of field guides 5 Nature Reserve triples in size 100s of conservation handbooks Frogmore Meadows has been Binoculars & spotting scopes extended thanks to a generous legacy. Hand lenses & microscopes Pond dipping nets 1000s of natural history books 8 Goose migration New research reveal the secrets of goose migration. Huge product range Rapid shipping Exceptional customer service YOUR Over 140,000 books & equipment products UK & Worldwide Specialist help and advice WILDLIFE TRUST 16 Find out how local businesses and www.nhbs.com | Serving conservation since 1985 | +44 1803 865913 the community support our work. Stars of the night © TOM MARSHALL TOM © Discover one of our most 20 Thorley Wash secretive nocturnal hunters! Learn more about this wildlife haven for threatened species. More on 10 WILDLIFEWILDLIFE TRAVELTRAVEL More than 30 years of supporting nature conservation, ALL our profits are donated to the Wildlife Trusts, CONSERVATION raising in excess of £220,000 since 1988. Travel with us and help to protect your local wildlife. 22 Nature’s Calendar 24 An extraordinary fondness 26 The Nature of a Hedgerow for beetles Tim Hill tells us about Find out what lives in and 2019/20 destinations include: Botswana, Ethiopia wildlife activities in spring. Hear from author Trevor James around your hedge. about his love for beetles. Chile, Colombia, Galapagos, Pantanal Transylvania, Morocco, Armenia Scilly, Mull, Devon, Burren Bulgaria, Estonia HERTS & MIDDLESEX WILDLIFE TRUST relaxed pace Macedonia Grebe House, St Michael’s Street, Lesvos Registered Charity No: 239863 St Albans, Herts AL3 4SN More info expert leaders online Registered in England: 816710 01727 858 901 [email protected] hertswildlifetrust.org.uk All rights reserved. No part may be small friendly groups Discover reproduced without written permission wildlife Editorial Team Josh Kubale from the editor. The publishers do not natural history holidays necessarily identify with or hold and Frieda Rummenhohl Donate 01727 858 901 x 240 themselves responsible for the views ATOL protected No. 808 No. protected ATOL [email protected] expressed by contributors, www.wildlife-travel.co.uk Join an correspondents or www.wildlife-travel.co.uk [email protected] event advertisers. 01954 713575 Membership Alan Cotterell Do 01727 858 901 x 234 Summer 2019 issue Cover image: [email protected] copy deadline: Stag beetle © 24 May 2019 Terry Whittaker © Design TGDH www.tgdh.co.uk Printed on FSC Certified Stock / 2020VISION 2 wildlifematters Spring 2019 Find us on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram Spring 2019 wildlifematters 3 From the Chief Executive Quack-Nav! I’m very pleased to be able to introduce this edition of Wildlife Matters with the wonderful news The Trust has fitted about new land coming under the care of the Trust at Frogmore Meadows. This is thanks to ducks with GPS trackers the very generous legacy left to the Trust by Gerald Salisbury who was a volunteer to shed light on how warden of the reserve for many years and who loved the site. they use reservoirs and This exciting news maps to influence decisions around a bold visionary piece of legislation lakes in Greater London. comes at a critical built development and farming in order proportionate to the vast environmental The project is thought to be time for wildlife in the to ensure that wildlife is taken into challenge we face. Unless Ministers and the first of its kind and aims UK. In December last account. MPs improve upon this draft Bill, we will to provide information on year, the draft new continue to see a decline in our wildlife Over the past months, I have contacted the activities of the wintering Environment Bill was and the health of our ecosystems for all our MPs to ask them to stand wildfowl – where they feed, published alongside generations to come. Contacting your up for wildlife and make sure that where they roost, when they a policy note setting MP is very easy and we’ve created some the legislation is sufficiently robust. move and what routes they use. out the Government’s helpful tips. A number of MPs have joined us out ambitions for part Four ducks have so far been on site at our reserves to see the work Find out how you can support two of the Bill. Sadly, tagged at Rye Meads Nature that we are doing and to understand the Wilder Future campaign in their current form these fall well Reserve in the Lea Valley near the impact that wildlife legislation has. at hertswildlifetrust.org.uk/ short of what is needed. We need the Hoddesdon and the project is wilderfuture proposed environmental watchdog You can make a difference by adding expected to expand to further to be much more independent and your voice. The Wildlife Trusts have Thank you for your continued water bodies in the Colne Valley able to hold the whole Government launched the Wilder Future national support of the Trust and your help Frogmore and near Heathrow. to account. It is also vital that the Bill campaign to encourage our supporters for local wildlife. The ducks have been fitted makes it a statutory requirement to to contact their MPs and ask them Meadows with GPS trackers which will produce Nature Recovery Network to stand up for wildlife and create allow researchers to track their triples in size! movements remotely as they move between water bodies in the Greater London area. The project, which is a partnership Tony Juniper at University of Hertfordshire Herts and Middlesex Wildlife between the Trust, Environment Trust has purchased land Writer, environmental activist and University of Hertfordshire from 7pm on April 2nd. Agency, Lee Valley Regional Park President of the Wildlife Trusts, The event is free to attend, but booking is essential. adjacent to its existing Authority and Thames Water, Tony Juniper will give his talk on Frogmore Meadows Nature will help identify which water Book your place online at ‘Can the UK be a world leader? Reserve. The enlarged nature bodies are most important and hertswildlifetrust.org.uk/events will help researchers understand How a new Environment Act reserve, which sits in the Chess could help save the planet’ at the how best to manage these sites Valley, now covers 25 acres for waterfowl. – three times the size of the Find out more on original site. hertswildlifetrust.org. The purchase was made possible meadow-management techniques uk/news from a generous legacy left to the including grazing and haymaking. Trust by Gerald Salisbury, who passed Frogmore Meadows sits in a away in 2015. Gerald had been a long- floodplain and the soils found there, ROPER PAUL © Can you help uncover term volunteer warden at Frogmore when managed correctly, support Meadows and was instrumental in an abundance of meadow grasses, Hertfordshire’s Natural History? helping the Trust care for the meadows. orchids and wildflowers. In summer, Environmental Records Centre (HERC), which is hosted by As recognition of his dedication to the Herts Environmental Records Centre has Frogmore Meadows is awash with the Trust, has developed bespoke text recognition software site, the Trust has named the original partnered with Hertfordshire Natural History beautiful flowers which are an to scan the journals and is now looking for volunteers reserve ‘Gerald’s Meadow’. important food source for many Society to digitise nearly 150 years’ worth to help complete this project. A small portion of the text The extended nature reserve insects such as bees and butterflies. of records. cannot be recognised automatically and needs to be comprises rare water meadows and looked at and filled in manually. Find out more and plan your The Society’s historic journals, which date back to the is designated as a Site of Special visit by visiting 1870s, are currently only available in paper format. The If you can spare some time and want to help, Scientific Interest (SSSI). The Trust has hertswildlifetrust.org.uk/ project will make them available freely to the general please get in touch with Ian Carle at been managing the original nature reserves public through a fully searchable web database. Herts [email protected] or 01727 858 901. reserve since 1985 using traditional Male gadwall at Rye Meads with GPS tag 4 wildlifematters Spring 2019 Spring 2019 wildlifematters 5 New report shows nature-friendly Y H P A R G O T farming boosts wildlife O H P S L L I H Y E also support insects that feed on Farmers, the guardians of nearly three-quarters of land in R R crop pests. Insect larvae are food for U S the UK, have an essential role to play in wildlife conservation. - partridge, lapwing and yellowhammer S N A new report from The Wildlife Trusts shows how locally I chicks. The scheme helps create bigger, L K i W n A better and more joined up spaces for tailor-made farm wildlife plans, devised by Wildlife Trust n H et N wildlife to thrive.

Load more

  15

Copy Link