The Lings team have been finishing off this year's fencing season with the replacement of a gate and a couple of gate posts as well as one or two lengths of particularly shabby fencing - some done with volunteers, others with staff. It's always a satisfying job it all looks so much better when you've finished. 

The Ring Haw volunteers have gone above and beyond recently by clearing around and painting the entire Ring Haw tool store. It looks like new! 

Mowing and cutting back paths at Storton's Pits has been a bigger job than usual this year as things seem to have been growing even faster than usual. Again, it's quite a job with staff mowing and volunteers trimming back and raking up, but it does look good when it's done and means the paths are much more passable.

Our Conservation grazing team have had a busy summer. Our highland cows have finished calving, we ended up with a grand total of 6 calves 4 bulls and 2 heifers. Majestic our bull has gone back out with the cows to hopefully sire next year’s generation of calves. Mouflon ewes and their lamb have been let loose at Summer Leys, and are continuing to confuse the photographers, are they more like a goat, deer or sheep? Who knows. And our sheep have all had their fleeces off which I’m sure their very grateful for with the unusual warm British summer. 

At the Nene Wetlands we have been exploring the ever-changing landscape within the beaver enclosure at Delta Pit and it has been great seeing them creating a home and diversifying the habitat on site, there always something new and unexpected to see with each visit. 

For an update on what's been happening in the Nene Wetlands during the summer, see Pete Bray's latest blog post.

At Pitsford we did not believe we would be driving on site by April after the extremely wet winter, but it seems to be one extreme to the next.  Path improvements are well underway to ensure that come rain or shine, the site will be walkable all year.  The Sand Martins are back in the purpose-built bank.  Thanks to the Northants Ringing Group, we know that we had one of the chicks that fledged from the Rutland banks now using ours to start their breeding.  Osprey and Kingfishers have been delighting birdwatchers all through the season.  If you would like to hear seasonal updates of what has been happening at Pitsford, sign up to receive the Pitsford ENews here… E-news | Wildlife Trust for Beds Cambs & Northants

Two iron aged pigs have returned to Lilbourne to help with the management of the invasive plant Crassula and hopefully prevent it taking over the wetland areas.  The pigs are being used in the marsh area to break up and dig up the thick mats of crassula, to expose the bare mud, and hopefully improve the area for wading birds. A section of the reserve is now open to the public and is being well used by the local community.

Northants Wider Countryside 

1. Thanks to a local member getting in touch, we visited an old orchard in Wellingborough which had plenty of great invertebrate habitat.  The fruit trees are the remnants of a much larger orchard that existed before the houses were built in the area in the late 1950s.  The trees were being used by Red-belted Clearwing Moths, a nationally scarce species whose caterpillars live underneath the bark of apple trees.

    

2. We’ve been busy visiting churchyards as part of the Northamptonshire Churchyard Conservation Award Scheme.  There are so many fantastic spaces for wildlife in churchyards across the county.  A highlight from the last few months has been visiting St Giles’ Church in the middle of Northampton who, amongst other things, have made some beautiful signs to help visitors appreciate the wildlife habitats that are being created there including establishing a wildflower meadow – right in the middle of the town!

    

3. The Wider Countrysides grassland survey volunteers have been out exploring again. These self-led surveys allow our team to quickly see if a site is of potential interest for our Local Wildlife Site scheme without having to visit ourselves. The survey data from a volunteer last Summer led Patsy to do a full survey at a new-to-us site in the west of the county.  Here she recorded Marsh Stitchwort in local abundance which is a species rare in the county occurring in under 5 populations. The key difference from other Stitchworts (Stellaria species) is the bract which is partially translucent on Marsh Stitchwort. This privately owned site will be put forward for the Local Wildlife Scheme and would not have been prioritised if not for volunteers. 
   
    

4. We have been conducting Wildlife Site surveys for the past few months across a variety of habitats from ancient woodlands, to grasslands and some wetland sites. Highlights have included hearing many cuckoos out and about this year, many more than previous years seemingly. It was also great to see some water vole signs on surveys of the Grand Union Canal, seemingly expanding in range with the increased mink control in place across our 3 counties. The team and Gavin Bennett have conducted over 40 surveys engaging with 30+ landowners across the county. 

    

5. As usual, no two days have been the same for Lara Jones as our SPA Engagement Officer,  but the highlight for the past few months is definitely the work she has been doing with the Kinewell committee. We have devised a number of ways that the community can engage more with them, such as an honesty box in the car park which has helped to boost their finances, and I have trained them in leading bat walks- their first one is coming up soon. We have also been working on creating a shaded picnic/ den building area that will also be suitable for running stallholder events outside of the SPA/ SSSI boundary, in order to deliver an annual programme of engagement activities which will help them achieve their charitable aims. Building the relationship with the group has been a pleasure and they have expressed that they are grateful for the support and guidance (largely by way of feeding us lots of cake!)