Wilmslow and Knutsford Group

Newsletter: Winter 2005

Reports from Local Reserves

Saltersley Moss
The area of bilberry and heather has gradually increased thanks to work by volunteers to remove the “3 Bs” (birch, bracken and bramble). If you visit, you will notice that some of the birch has regrown from stumps. This is not an oversight, but deliberate policy on our part to provide resting sites for the male green hairstreak butterflies during the late spring/early summer breeding season. Once the regrowth reaches more than about 1.5m high, we cut it back once more. We’re hoping to once again have a visit from the Macclesfield Conservation Volunteers later this winter. It would be great to have a few CWT members along to help out: we don’t yet have a date.
Managers: Mark and Ann Norman

Cotterill Clough
During late spring and early summer the volunteer wardens are kept busy keeping the paths as clear as possible. Leave it a few weeks and it looks like we haven’t been near for months, such is the rate of growth. The large scythe which is kept on site has been in use maintaining the glade, which is appreciated by the butterflies and dragonflies, although not by my back!

June Oliver has had regular badger watches: the lack of young has meant they have not been as enthralling as in the past. This disappointment has been compensated for by two families of foxes who each raised four cubs at the outlying badger setts. Showing no fear of humans, the cubs ignored observers who were within 2 metres as they fed on a young rabbit left by the adult under a bramble thicket.

Although the owl chimney failed to repeat last year’s success, they did raise at least two chicks elsewhere on the reserve using more traditional accommodation. The new bat boxes on the fringe of the glade produced three different results: one was used as a bird roost, having a wider opening; the second contained bat droppings and the third a single pipestrelle!

The brook continues to improve. When I first started visiting, it was completely sterile due to pollution from the airport, but now it has good numbers of sticklebacks, dragonflies patrol the floodplain, and a pair of grey wagtails are frequent visitors. John Heine has constructed an ingenious bird box in the entrance to the tunnel where the brook is culverted under the road, a ‘des res’ for any family of wagtails.

I have just spent a balmy sunny Sunday morning in mid-October down on the reserve. However the weather is deceptive; the last swallows from Castle Mill are long gone. The advance guard of redwings have just arrived in the clough, and a yellow and gold carpet covers the reserve. I suspect that by the time you read this, we shall all be looking forward to spring, the best and most exciting time of year here at Cotterill.
Manager: Steve McGann

Knutsford Moor Pool Event – September 2005
Congratulations to CWT and the friends of Knutsford Moor who organised the Bird Box making, cleaning of Moor pool and litter pickup. The day proved to be a well thought out and highly effective way of showing what can be done to involve local residents in the general improvement of this area in the centre of Knutsford. Many thanks to all who turned up.

Small Mammal Course – report from Jane McHarry
I have always had a soft spot for those tiny mammals we rarely see and jumped at the chance to attend a small mammal identification course run by the Mammal Society at Chester Zoo in September.

What a fascinating day it was! We were taken to an area of rough grassland with hedgerows and ditches where traps had been set some couple of days earlier. Then the fun began. First we were shown how the traps were set and released and watched while the first few were opened, the tiny creatures taken out and held unresisting by the scruff of the neck so that they could be identified, sexed and sometimes even marked by a tiny fur clip. They were then recorded before being released to dive for cover.

Bob Smith from the Zoo and Kathryn Walsh from the Wildlife Trust then accompanied groups so that we could practise opening traps and handling the animals. During the morning we identified six species including my favourite, the tiny pygmy shrew.

Now we need to put our new found skills to some use, so if any readers have a suggestion for a survey site, contact Grebe House who will see what can be arranged.

Dates for your Diary

Buffet Lunch
From noon on Sunday 22 January 2006, hosted by Jane & Jim at 16 Ashworth Park, Knutsford. Tickets: £5 (bring own drink) should be ordered in advance from Jane or Neil before 7 January
All welcome, both old and new members.

Wildlife Day at the Carrs, Wilmslow 7th May 2006 11am to 4pm
The group, with help from HQ at Reaseheath, are organising this day with The friends of the Carrs and Macclesfield Borough Council. We hope many organisations wil take part, such as R.S.P.B., Butterfly Conservation, Bollin Valley Project, Macclesfield Rangers etc.

Activities will include nest box making, pond dipping etc. If you can help and have any ideas for activities for young and old we would like to hear from you.