Local January - April 2017 A news and events diary from wildlife and conservation groups in Wildlife the Ipswich area News © Alan Baldry Making Ipswich the most hedgehog friendly town - see page 12 Produced by the Spring Wood Celebration Day A free event for all the family to enjoy the wildlife and nature of Spring Wood and Kiln Meadow Fun activities and storytelling for kids Folk music and dancing Have a go at ancient woodcraft Guided walks in the woods Make your own bird box Refreshments or bring a picnic Bank Holiday Monday 1st May 11am to 4pm Parking at Bourne Park off Stoke Park Drive with free minibus to the event. Please come on foot, by bike or bus if you can. Pedestrian entrance to Kiln Meadow off Marbled White Drive, Pinewood. For further details call 01473 726082 (on the day 07736 826076). Email [email protected] or www.greenlivingcentre.org.uk/greenways Welcome Welcome to the winter/spring edition of Local Wildlife News magazine – produced by the Greenways Countryside Project to help connect local people with the wildlife and activities going on in the wider Ipswich area. ‘Wild Ipswich’ is a term you might see in several articles throughout this edition. It is the name we 6 have given to our work with all the conservation organisations in the area to protect and improve the wildlife network of the town. Most importantly, it is the means by which we hope people in the town and surrounding area will get even more involved in helping wildlife – whether by installing ‘wildlife homes’ in their gardens or helping to look after the local park or nature reserve as volunteers. In this edition, there is a focus on Suffolk Wildlife Trust’s new hedgehog project for Ipswich – please read the details of how you can get involved and become a ‘hedgehog champion’ on page 12. In early summer, another new initiative will start in Ipswich – the Greenways Project and Ipswich 9 Borough Council are joining forces with Buglife (the national charity working to conserve invertebrate life – “Saving the small things that run the planet!”) to bring ‘Urban Buzz’ to Ipswich. Urban Buzz is a national Buglife initiative focussed on 8 cities in the UK, to improve habitat for pollinating insects in urban areas. Urban Buzz will help create 100 new ‘Buzzing hotspots’ – new areas of nectar-rich habitat – and will seek to engage local people through events and public votes for site improvements. See the next edition for more information. If you have never been involved in practical conservation volunteering before, or haven’t been for a while – winter is the perfect time to get into it! It’s the busiest season in the conservation calendar, when most of the habitat management work is done (as no birds are nesting and most other © Angie Tighe 12 wildlife is dormant, less active or migrated away) – coppicing in woodlands, clearing scrub from meadows and heaths, hedge cutting, and tree and shrub planting. There are loads of opportunities to get involved in your area – please see the events listings and ‘Regular Events’ at the back of the magazine to see how you can play your part in ‘Wild Ipswich’! Mailing lists – Please note We are aware that some who are members of several conservation organisations may well receive more than one copy of the newsletter. If this is the case we would be very grateful if you could pass 17 on the spare copy. If on the other hand you don’t currently receive LWN regularly, but would like to, please consider joining one of the groups that distributes LWN to its members (i.e. Suffolk Wildlife Trust, Ipswich Wildlife Group, RSPB etc). LWN is available online at www.greenlivingcentre.org.uk/greenways/ James Baker 1719 Contents Page Suffolk Wildlife Trust 4 21 Ipswich Wildlife Group 8 Local Wildlife News is published by Friends of the Dales 9 Greenways Countryside Project. Greenways Countryside Project 10 Editor: James Baker [email protected] Wild Ipswich 12 Tel 01473 433995 Production Editor: Colin Hullis Portal Woodlands Conservation Group 13 [email protected] Tel 01473 728674 RSPB Ipswich Local Group 14 Artwork production: Chris Saunders Friends of Christchurch Park 16 [email protected] Tel 01473 721550 Ipswich Borough Council Wildlife Rangers 17 Printed by The Five Castles Press Tel 01473 718719 Suffolk Ornithologists’ Group 18 Paper produced from well-managed Friends of Holywells Park 19 forests certified by the Forest Stewardship Council Friends of Belstead Brook Park 20 The opinions expressed in Local Wildlife News are not necessarily Snippets 21 those of the Greenways Project. Events Diary 22 3 Ipswich Group Newsletter Chairman: David Munday 01473 217310 [email protected] Secretary: Wendy Brown 01473 259674 [email protected] Treasurer: Tony Clarke 01473 741083 [email protected] Newsletter Editor: John Ireland 01473 723179 [email protected] Group contact: [email protected] We are the Ipswich Group of the Suffolk Wildlife Trust. We offer an interesting range of monthly meetings with guest speakers which take place usually on the third Wednesday of the month at 7.30 p.m. in the hall of St Margaret’s Primary School, Bolton Lane, Ipswich. Trust members and non-members are equally welcome. During the summer months we offer a variety of trips, some local, others by coach. Details of these and our monthly meetings can be found in our ‘Diary’ section which follows, or on the SWT website, www.suffolkwildlifetrust.org. Chairman’s Letter BTO Trip Were you on our coach trip to the BTO Nunnery in May? If so Suffolk Broads you may like to look at a short DVD they have made about the As I write this at the end of October the fantastic news that Nunnery. If you were not on that trip then a look at this film SWT have the opportunity to buy much land linking Carlton may inspire you to pay a visit in the future! You will find it at and Oulton Marshes. Yes, 384 acres, how many football www.bto.org/reserve and click on Nunnery Lakes Reserve. pitches is that? (The oft used comparison to measure wildlife sites). The land will be used to create a mix of wet habitats. Derek Moore The Trust needs to raise £1 million to buy this land, so please Many of you remember Derek Moore with much affection and do anything you can to help. More details are to be found at you will be pleased to know that we, together with Suffolk www.suffolkwildlifetrust.org Ornithologists Group (SOG), are organising a special Memorial evening with a presentation by a well known speaker. We Dave Munday have earmarked 18th October 2017, so pencil in the date! (Chairman) Coach Outing to the Norfolk Broads visiting How Hill and a Broads Boat Tour Saturday 27th May 2017 8.30am The Ipswich Group’s Coach Outing this year will be to the in late May. It supports a variety of habitats, with interesting Norfolk Broads. In the morning we shall go to How Hill, an plant communities and their associated insects. A visit can be Environmental Education Centre, which during the week made to Toad Hole, once a marshman’s cottage, to see how has groups of children staying. This house is surrounded by folk lived here 100 years ago. lovely gardens and woodland, planted with trees of many varieties, including azaleas and rhododendrons, which should In the afternoon we shall go to Wroxham, where we board be at their best at this time of year. The house has a café a Broads Tour Boat for a two-hour trip on the water, visiting where apparently delicious cakes and sandwiches can be Wroxham and Salthouse Broads and Horning Reach, with its bought. It is just a walk across the field to How Hill Nature stunning scenery and bird life. There will be a commentary Reserve. Here you can follow the 2km long wildlife walking about the history of the broads and the wildlife we see. There trail through the reed marshes in the valley of the River Ant, is a licensed bar and simple snack bar aboard. For more hear a variety of warblers and hopefully see Swallow-tail information Google How Hill Trust, How Hill Nature Reserve, butterflies, and Norfolk Hawker Dragonflies normally around Broads Tours. Booking Form Norfolk Broads, How Hill and Broads Tour 27th May 2017 8.30 am Please reserve ……… adult places at £30 Total £…………… ………places for 16 years and under at £20 Total £…………… Total sum enclosed £…………… Name ……………………………………………..............……………………............................…………… Address …………………………………........................................... Postcode ……............................... Telephone ………..........……… Email ……...........................................................…............................... Join coach at Crown Street or Ipswich Village Car Park (delete as appropriate) Please return this form together with an SAE and cheque made out to Suffolk Wildlife Trust to Pam Ireland, 49 Mayfield Road, Ipswich, IP4 3NG. Enquiries Tel 01473 723179 If you give an e-mail address you do not need to include a stamped addressed envelope. 4 Ipswich Group Newsletter Guided Walk at Snape Marshes © Barry Cooper Our walk on Saturday 18th June got off to a drizzly start as hunt all morning flying we gathered on the bridge at Snape. We followed Derek backwards and forwards and Lesley Walduck, volunteer wardens for the Snape SWT to its nest box. The reserve away from the road and down the ‘Sailor’s Path’ previous night had been beside the River Alde. Signs of massive amounts of earth very wet so it was forced works soon became obvious just to our left. This was the start to hunt in daylight. Derek of improvements to the river wall which had been broached explained that barn owl during the floods of December 2013 and had resulted in the feathers are specially flooding of the Reserve and many houses in Snape village.