Discover this local woodland in Spring with this guided walk, starting at 2.00pm at the northern Greenways Road kissing gate entrance to Ridge Wood, Yate.
Ecologist Rupert Higgins will lead the walk through Ridge Wood Local Nature Reserve to discover bluebells, wild garlic and primroses. Walkers can also discover more unusually named woodland plants such wood anemone and dog’s mercury.The walk has been organised by South Gloucestershire Council and the Friends of Ridge Wood.
The route is just under a mile and follows the main path through the woodland. There will be a chance to find out more about how this site is managed through the council’s management plan.
Traditional orchards are a much loved part of our British heritage and countryside providing fruit and peaceful places to enjoy, as well as food and shelter for hundreds of rare plants and animals.
Since 1950 Natural England estimates that overall orchard area in England has declined by 63%, and it’s probably higher in our area because of all the building developments.
The People’s Trust for Endangered Species (PTES) recently carried out an England orchard inventory, listing 321 potential traditional orchards in South Gloucestershire covering an area of 127.9 hectares. So far, owner questionnaires have revealed that 8% of traditional orchards in South Gloucestershire are in excellent condition, 40% in good condition and 52% in poor condition. 12 traditional orchards were in Environmental stewardship comprising 9.10 hectares. Further information about the national survey can be found at www.ptes.org.
The South Gloucestershire Orchard survey will now build on the work undertaken by the national survey and aims to fill the gaps, where survey data has not been verified and by identifying orchards that have been left out.
South Gloucestershire Council currently have a work placement volunteer who is looking at the 1915 maps to find out just how many orchards have been lost locally. It’s early days but the losses for most parishes look to be around 90% which represents an area of anywhere between 3ha (Bradley Stoke) and 60ha (Thornbury).
Could YOU help with this community project? South Glos is currently looking for volunteers to take part in the survey and help verify the orchards in the parish.
South Gloucestershire Council offer small environmental grants for community groups or landowners wishing to restore or create traditional orchards, just like the one created at Wapley last year. Contact John Morris on 01454 863581 or email johnv.morris@southglos.gov.uk for more information, or download details from: www.southglos.gov.uk/environmentalgrants.
Wapley Bushes’ Jubilee project is complete! 800 trees have been planted to produce a new hedge on Wapley Bushes Local Nature Reserve.
The hedge was planted by a combination of volunteers and local contractors. More than twenty local people and Wildlife Trust members got together on Mothering Sunday (18th March) and planted a hundred yards of hedge in less than three hours.
This hedge will be an excellent wildlife habitat and food source in the years ahead for mammals, birds and insects once it has become fully established. All the plants in the hedge mix are native species such dogwood, hazel, hawthorn, etc. and they will ensure that the hedge has a high wildlife value.
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This project shows what can be achieved when lots of organisations and individuals get together. Wapley Bushes Conservation Group coordinated the work, which included preparation work funded by Dodington Parish Council. Local contractors Landcare Tree Nursery supplied and planted half the trees, paid for by a Biodiversity and Landscsape Grant from South Gloucestershire Council.
The trees planted by our volunteers came from the Woodland Trust’s Free Tree Packs scheme. That initiative was jointly funded by the furniture group IKEA and three volunteers from the IKEA Bristol store also turned up to help with the planting and with putting the rabbit guards around the plants.
The new Jubilee Hedge marks the boundary of the Centenary Wood, which was planted by volunteers in 1994 to mark 100 years of Dodington Parish Council. The Woodland Trust scheme aims to plant six million trees to mark the Queen’s Jubilee.
A major project comes to fruition this weekend with the reopening of the Kennedy Way pond (opposite the petrol station). The Wildlife Trust, working with South Glos Council, secured a large grant from Viridor the waste recycling company to totally refurbish this pond as a valauble wildlife resource.
The pond will be opened at 10 am on Saturday, and the event will be followed by a Spring Clean litter collection along the River Frome, organised by Yate Town Council and Chipping Sodbury Baptist Church.
South Glos are providing bags, litter pickers, gloves etc., but feel free to bring your own if you have them.
This splendid woodland in Wapley Bushes Local Nature Reserve was planted by volunteers in a single morning on Mothers Day in 1994. Eighty people took part, half of them children. The trees are now over twenty feet tall, and now they need a hedge to mark the border between the woodland and the Upper Meadow.
Please come and help this Sunday morning, March 18th. We would love to see some of the parents and particularly the children, now grown up, who took part in the original planting so long ago. Who knows, maybe they could bring along some of the next generation too?
Everyone is welcome – we will be meeting at 10.00 am at the Shire Way entrance to the Nature Reserve, near the zebra crossing opposite Cherington, South Yate. Please wear wellies or similar, and bring a spade if you can.
The trees for the hedge planting morning are being provided by the Woodland Trust as part of their Queen Elizabeth’s Diamond Jubilee Year Project to plant 6 million trees nationwide. A second length of the Jubilee Hedge has been funded by South Gloucestershire Council’s Biodiversity & Landscape Grant scheme and by Dodington Parish Council’s annual grant to Wapley Bushes Conservation Group.
We are very grateful to all our partners and supporters. Without the necessary funding and advice we wouldn’t be able to improve this lovely area for future generations.
It was good to see so many people at the workday on Sunday 22 January – we had 18 volunteers, so we were able to tackle a wide variety of work. We planted 20 trees in the gaps in the laid hedge at the bottom of the lower meadow, cut back overhanging trees and brambles, and did a lot of tidying-up. As a bonus, one of our groups of volunteers saw two deer at fairly close range! Here are a few photos from the day:
Clearing overhanging branches from popular paths
Derek taking a swing at the undergrowth with a slasher
Malcolm cutting back brambles and dragging them away
This is your chance to have some fun and pick a team of Eggheads and bring them along to our general knowledge quiz. We have found this to be a very popular event and you are most welcome make up a team name and bring your own snacks and beverages. We will also be serving tea and coffee for you in the break.
Quiz teams are usually made up of four players at a cost of £2 each per person. Please contact Malcolm on 01454 310328 to book your team’s place.
The Old Grammar School, High Street, Chipping Sodbury, 7.30pm.
This is your chance to burn off some of those Christmas calories by joining us for our first workday of the new year. We shall be undertaking general management tasks that will help to enhance the biodiversity of this precious nature reserve. Please wear walking or wellington boots and bring some gloves.
Meet at the Shire Way entrance gate, South Yate, 10.00am.
