The Suffolk Argus any of our members reading this feel the urge to join us for a future work party you would be more than welcome. It isn’t going to be the same type of work every month and during spring and summer we will be spending lots of time observing and recording the wildlife, not least Silverstudded Blues (fingers crossed for a good year!). It’s important to remember that the recording element is equally as important as the practical habitat management. Without it we would have less knowledge to call upon for choosing the right type of management, plus very little measure of success for the habitat management undertaken.
Finally, in addition to these monthly work parties we were pleased to join with the Greenways Countryside Project and Ipswich Wildlife Group on 21st January 2012, for the annual Megabash event. Around fifty - yes fifty! - people came and gave their time to help clear a tremendous amount of invasive scrub from the central areas of heather. It was pleasing to note that some of the people were local residents. Purdis Heath is privately owned and its future is not certain, both for the wildlife and the people that visit and enjoy it. Therefore, it is vital that the people living close value and care for their local patch of “purple heather paradise”.
Grass management project - Biodiversity boost for Ipswich Matt Berry In my day job, working for Ipswich Borough Council as their Wildlife Team Leader, I have been drawing up plans for a project that could see significant benefits to wildlife in the town. These are challenging times for any Local Authority, having to balance good service provision to the public with ever decreasing resources. I was asked to investigate whether there was scope to reduce the amount of grass that was mown short throughout the year, whilst providing real benefit to wildlife and people. I already have extensive experience of converting short mown grass areas into wildlife habitat. For example, Landseer Park, which was up until ten years ago not much more than a green desert of short grass. Now it is has over 20 acres of
meadow, hundreds of new trees and lots more wildlife! So significant has the positive change been that it was designated a County Wildlife Site in 2008 and plans are now afoot to declare it a Local Nature Reserve. The most logical starting point for this project was to audit the town for other similarly large areas of grass that could be easily converted to meadow, scrub, woodland, or a mixture of all three. The town is blessed with a plethora of parks and open spaces so that was where I began my search. However, a strategic landscape approach was also in order and so areas outside parks that could act as corridors or stepping stones for wildlife were also sought out. 26 locations were identified, that added up to an area of 35 hectares – an area
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