30.06.11 Balsam pulling & Sunday's Bug Hunt Event

As a group we have been pulling balsam up for weeks on the LNR. The determination to get the job done is brilliant, dog walkers are pulling it up here and there and tonight we had a record 8 people out altogether (although 1 was more a spectator as sandals were worn by accident; maybe next time!!). Steve was off pulling again with his dog and we had a chat about covering balsam areas to ecrease spread. By 7 pm Tricia and I continued the pulling work undertaken yesterday by Maria, Beau and myself, which in turn continued from Tricia's work on Tuesday of this week. Shortly afterwards, Kim and Brandon were came along with Brndon's brother Conner and a set of grandparents. They all joined in with aplomb and the swollen ranks cleared a huge area which was a great soul-lifter for us.

We also took a photo of another moth which we will try and look up ASAP. NOTE:- It is probably a Common Emerald (Hemithea aestivaria)

Leading on from which is a reminder that this Sunday is a bug Hunt at 11 am meeting in the Car Park. The aim of this is to start recording some of the species that we have in the mosaic of habitats on the LNR. So we have plenty of nets and I'll have my camera with macro lens to take as many photos as possible of the things we can find.

21.06.11 More Balsam Pulled...Great Strides Made

Tonight we had Steve, who was out walking his dog, Kay and Isobel (who were out walking their dog) and myself pulling up more balsam. Isobel then ran home and grabbed her brother Brandon who only wanted to come out on Thursday for the planned event. Unfortunately, I have to geve a talk in Cardiff on Thursday so we went out today instead.

We started off further up towards the noticeboard today for the first hour.

From Jun 21, 2011 balsam

Following this, we went over to the burnt oak. This was a mass of balsam last year, and was also a mass this year, except around the oak itself. This must have been the edge of the spread last year and we pulled it before seeds were set. However, the area behind the oak was a mass of balsam, intermixes with bracken and bramble. We set on to this with aplomb. Moreover, we were very please to release the crab apple tree, the ash tree and the field maple from the balsam. The other trees in the area which Patricia and I cleared of brambles last year look much healthier this year too.
No organised event this Thursday, but feel free to pick up balsam as you go, or when you stop for a chat with other dog walkers.

19.11.11 Pulling on Saturday Morning and Sunday Afternoon

We pulled again on Saturday morning

From Jun 19, 2011 Panoramic Saturday

and again on Sunday afternoon.

From Jun 19, 2011 Panoramic Saturday

The balsam is budding up now, so time is very short, we will be going out almost every night now with a main meet on Monday and Tuesday @6pm. If you are out walking about, feel free to pulls some up, but don't forget to bend it in half and give it a twist or it may regrow.
Here are some quick movies from before and after on Sunday:
Meadow Before

Meadow After

Jungle Before

Jungle After

New Himalayan Balsam Champions

This blog is intended to be just about Henllys LNR. However, today in Cardiff with my Cardiff Friday Morning Project Group, our numbers were bolstered with a class of children from Holy Family RC School from Fairwater. In two hours we collected a pile of balsam that beats all others so far. The gauntlet is down and I reckon we need to do something about it. So, next Thursday, 6pm meeting at the car park, let's try to beat them.

From Jun 17, 2011 Cardiff Friday Morning Project Balsam Champions

16.06.11 More balsam pulling and more balsam pullers

Maria, Beau and I started off pulling balsam down to the left from the new notice board and as we pulled, several people who already pulled some balsam joined in with our work. We finished off the area we started 2 weeks ago and then moved down into the patch opposite where the balsam had started to encroach onto the grassland.

This was found in the grass near to the balsam - any ideas? UPDATE: We now think it is a small magpie moth Eurrhypara hortulata

Cheers to the newcomers Kim, Isabel and Brandon and to the fellow whose name I didn't catch, but who kindly informed me of the typo on the new Torfaen Greenweb site.

The first balsam was spotted in flower today, so all hands to the pump. You know what to do, pull it up, twist the stems and leave in a big pile like these. We'll be back out as a group next Thursday meeting 6 pm in the car park, but there is plenty more to do so keep on pulling!!

Oh. many of the pictures below were taking by budding photographer Beau:

Wild Weekend for Wales Grant and what we will do with it

The group recently were awarded a small Wild Weekend for Wales Grant from Keep Wales Tidy and B&Q. The grant enables us to perform several small but hopefully significant biodiversity actions on the LNR.

The first part is for materials to make habitat boxes for various animals including bat, small bird, dormice and an owl box. We know there are bats here already and an owl has been heard, but it is not known if the European Protected Species dormouse is present here. The boxes will allow us to monitor them for their presense. We will inspect the boxes twice a year, and as they are so protected, once we find evidence we can no longer touch them (a handling licence is required). If we do find them, this will affect the management of the woodland sections of the LNR.

The second part is to be able to sow small areas of native wildflower seeds in places of the LNR that have been ravaged by Himalayan balsam. These will be in areas away from the main meadow. One of the plans for this year is to cut the meadow after the flowers and grasses have finished flowering, but then rake it all off after first allowing the seeds to naturally drop back to the soil. we will also drag some of the freshly cut plants to bare areas to re-establish areas previously lost to Himalayan balsam.

09.06.11 Wild Weekend for Wales Bird and Dormouse boxes

We met up again for our second event in a week with our usual Thursday evening activity. This week the four of us made three bird boxes and two dormouse boxes. The latter are extremely tricky to make due to 1mm panel pins compared to the massive clout nails that we used on the bird boxes. The panel pins have a great tendency to bend just as you think you have it perfectly in position.

After we finished making the dormouse boxes we talked a bit about dormouse habitat and then placed the two boxes amongst some hazel trees on the LNR. We then camouflaged them with bracken.

Finally we couldn’t resist pulling up more Himalayan balsam.



Same time, 6pm in Henllys LNR Car Park for more balsam bashing (the buds are starting to appear so time is short).

Wild Weekend for Wales Bat boxes on Henllys LNR

Three of us braved this wet Sunday morning to make 3 bat boxes to go up on a tree on the LNR. It was great fun working out how the pieces go together and we then nailed the boxes so the bats will be safe and protected from wind and rain. The wood was preservative free as some preservatives can be harmful to bats which are a protected species.

We will be returning to the LNR car park on Thursday at 6pm to make some more boxes to go up around the LNR.

Here are some pictures from today:

New blog for Friends of Henllys LNR

After setting up my own blog for my Keep Wales Tidy work in Cardiff, I decided to set up one for the  the work we do as volunteers on Henllys LNR.
The major work last year was the first serious tackle of himalayn balsam. In 2009, I tested a trial plot of pulling up the balsam, which took me 4 hours. In 2010, this only took me 30 mins. In 2010, several volunteers joint together, or as individuals helped to pull up large areas of balsam.

The results of this are quite interesting. The areas in which we pulled regularly had very little regrowth this year, but the sites where balsam had been chemically sprayed or strimmed, had plenty of regrowth. There are loads of factors which could have affected this, but arguably we can control the spready of balsam if people just pull up a bit when they are walking their dogs, or stopping for a chat. You can't really confuse it with anything else on the LNR, but the following steps are important:

1. Pull the plant out completely, if the stem snaps it regrows with more flower heads than before and it can make things worse.

2. bend over the stems and twist them to damage the fibres. This helps to stop the plant from re-rooting.

3. Place the pulled balsam in large piles. This helps the rest of the ground to recover and decreases the area of nutrient enrichment.

Here's a slideshow of some shots I took today (pressing the speech box icon in the bottom left corner of the slideshow gives small comments on each photo):

Wild Weekend for Wales Event

First event of the year on the LNR.

Date: Sun 5th June

Meeting: Henllys Car Park just off Birch Grove.

Time: 11 am

Activity: we will be constructing bird, bat and dormouse boxes followed by their placement within the Local Nature Reserve.