NOT PROTECTIVELY MARKED Hartlepool Partnership for Nature Report April 2015 The Hartlepool Partnership for Nature is a longstanding partnership between: • EDF Energy (Hartlepool power station) • Natural England • Hartlepool Borough Council Countryside Wardens • The Teesmouth Field Centre Located in the EDF Energy visitor centre at Hartlepool power station, Tees Road, Hartlepool, TS25 2BZ. A monthly report is produced by the Partnership which provides an insight into their work and role in the local community. An Annual General Meeting is also held and members of the public are welcome to attend. Natural England – Mike Leakey The month was typified by dry sunny days and cool nights. Though the mean temperature was only 9°C – below average for the fourth successive month – we did enjoy our warmest April day since 2011 on St George’s Day, when the temperature rose to 21.1°C. It was another dry month, with a mere 13mm of rain. Indeed, total rainfall so far this year amounts to a paltry 82mm! The month saw the resumption of weekly butterfly transect surveys, though no more than a handful of individual insects of three species were recorded. 4 April – A wigeon originally ringed on Seal Sands on 27 October 2011 was spotted in Voronezh Oblast, Russia… 2728km away to the east! This is a good illustration of just how far some of our wintering water birds travel to and from their breeding areas. 13 April – An adult female otter was sadly killed by traffic on the A178 just north of Greatham Creek. 18 April - A cannon-net catch on Seal Sands resulted in the ringing and release of twenty shelduck, six redshank and two curlew. 20 April - The monthly Wetland Bird Survey count and the Seal Sands Low Tide Count both proved relatively uneventful. 21 April - The Friends of Teesmouth, Seaton Dunes and Common met at Seaton Carew Library; the next meeting is scheduled for 16:30 on 26 May at the same venue. The Group’s second health walk on the NNR/LNR will take place on Tuesday 19 May, starting at 10:30 from the North Gare Car Park. All are welcome at either the meeting or the walk….or both! NOT PROTECTIVELY MARKED 25 & 29 April - Sharp-eyed television viewers have had a double helping of the Reserve, with the Seaton Snook foreshore featuring as a backdrop in recent episodes of both Vera on 25 th April and George Gently on 29 th April. 28 April - Eight Hartlepool Countryside volunteers installed a replacement kissing gate on the Seal Sands Easy Access Path and repaired fencing at the Seal Sands car park and the North Gare pony enclosure. Fortunately the Reserve escaped the fires which enveloped a total of 2.55ha or 6.3 acres of the neighbouring Seaton Dunes Local Nature Reserve during the Easter holidays. However, other antisocial and illegal activities were recorded, the most serious of which involved six men with lurcher dogs actively stalking a roe deer east of the Long Drag. The witnesses had the presence of mind to note the number plate of a vehicle believed to belong to the men and the police are now investigating the incident. On Seal Sands itself, two periwinkle collectors were intercepted and evicted. Teesmouth Field Centre – Lynne Burn Easter holidays meant that the centre was quiet for the first two weeks of the month. However once the schools returned, the phone line was extremely busy with schools booking in for the summer. What had been a rather sparsely booked summer was virtually fully booked within two days! Schools which visited this month were: Ward Jackson Primary school studying the new Science of the Seashore project; Thorntree Primary School and Corpus Christi R C Primary School following the ‘Rivers’ study and St Paulinus R C Primary School studying the ‘Habitats’ project and creating some art work on the beach. One school had to cancel their visits, leaving one April date and three May dates empty. One of the May dates has since been booked and another school is interested in the other two. Mrs Burn visited Corpus Christi Primary School prior to their visit to introduce the River Tees study. Four primary schools brought a total of 111 children accompanied by a total of 17 adults. This month’s photos are by pupils from Ward Jackson Primary School, Hartlepool. ‘Compose your storyboard’ – a TNNR sign ‘Take your images’ – taking photos on the beach View at North Gare First flowers of Spring NOT PROTECTIVELY MARKED Hartlepool Borough Council Countryside Wardens – Deborah Jefferson Councillor Geoff Lilley passed on his sincere thanks to the Countryside Team and the volunteers for the fencing replacement carried out in the lay-by on the A689 between Queens Meadow and Sappers Corner and for repairs made at other points along the fence line. He said that local residents had commented on the difference to the environment on both sides of the fence. The fence not only provides a safe barrier between the Fens estate and the A689 but also prevents copious amounts of litter from entering the shelter belt, which forms a fantastic wildlife corridor extending along the southern boundary of the Fens. Fencing replacement on A689 Completed fence The Easter holidays were busy with events. A very sunny Easter Sunday brought out hordes of visitors to Ward Jackson Park to enjoy a brilliant Easter egg hunt organised by the Friends of the park. The queue to make our frog themed wildflower planters was continuous throughout the afternoon and we were left with only a handful of plant pots. We joined forces with the Wild Green Places project during Easter week to litter pick and plant primroses in Stranton Cemetery and then helped the Friends of Seaton Park to run their Easter Event. The Easter bunny (Left: Lucy Hall, one of our young volunteers) was in attendance and gave away free eggs to everyone who completed the Easter trail. Our final event of the holidays was spent meeting the Very Hungry Caterpillar during a warm sunny morning at Summerhill. Children enjoyed making a wooden caterpillar and The Easter Bunny planter before playing ‘match the caterpillar to the butterfly’ games in the woodland. NOT PROTECTIVELY MARKED Poppy with her Very Hungry Caterpillar St Paul’s Cub Scouts enjoy Hedgerow Planting We headed up to Elwick for a couple of days to clear areas of the village Wildlife Garden for Elwick Parish Council who are keen to revitalise the area. We joined Mike from Natural England to replace a gate at Seal Sands before repairing fencing at the car park and the pony enclosure at the North Gare. St Paul’s Cub scouts joined us for an evening to plant hedgerow trees around the pond in Seaton Park. The trees were donated by the Woodland Trust and will add to the many hundreds of trees the cubs have helped to plant in previous years. The only downside of the Easter break was a series of deliberately set fires which devastated large tracts of Seaton Dunes. Mike Leakey and Tom Charman from Natural England used a hand held GPS to map the extent of the damage which totalled 2.55ha or 6.3 acres; a degree of damage which is unprecedented in recent years. In the short to medium term, the impact on the plant and invertebrate communities is one of total destruction. We will be running a series of events to promote responsible use of the dunes, beginning with an activity at Low Tide Day on 17 May; a series of summer events and a Primary Schools Conference on 1 July. .