Out & About July 2017

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FURTHER INFORMATION:
Pictures:
Rob Appleby, Katie Smith
and Bob Coyle
Share your love for nature in
February says Jacky Akam
The Berks, Bucks & Oxon Wildlife Trust’s Linking the Landscape in West Berkshire project
is funded primarily by the Heritage Lottery Fund, and we are very grateful to our wonderful
volunteers with whom we are able to make the funds go so much further.
Come and be Wild at Heart with your local Wildlife Trust this month. Join in the fun with one
of the volunteer work parties, go on a guided walk to see birds and mosses, or find Magic
under the Microscope at West Berkshire Museum in Newbury.
All details on:
Nature worship
Bullfinch, one of the bird
species benefitting from
the wild ‘corridors’ and
‘stepping stones’
Volunteers fromThames Water
help to improve the paths in
Thatcham Reedbeds
Teen Rangers take practical action for wildlife
At the Berks, Bucks & Oxon
Wildlife Trust everyone’s Wild at
Heart; and, through our Linking
the Landscape project in West
Berkshire, we know that thousands of
people who live and work here love their
local wildlife too.
My job as the Linking the Landscape
project manager gives me the chance
to create opportunities for more people
to enjoy being outdoors and closer to
nature, not only in the wild spaces of the
nature reserves that the trust looks after,
but also across the wider landscape.
Over the last three years, the Wildlife
Trust has been working with local
landowners to create wildlife-friendly
‘corridors’ by using hedgerows, field
edges and woodlands to link habitats that
are essential for species such as dormice
and butterflies.
Ponds, meadows and coppiced woods
have become wild ‘stepping stones’ to
help wildlife such as reptiles and birds
move through the landscape to find food,
homes and mates.
This has all been achieved through
the extraordinary work of our regular
volunteer groups as well as corporate
teams who enjoy a wild work-out away
from the office.
Hundreds of volunteers take part in
weekly and monthly work parties doing
scrub clearance, coppicing, hedgelaying
and pulling up Himalayan Balsam. Other
volunteers spend time carefully surveying
butterflies and birds so that we can
monitor the effectiveness of the habitat
management work.
Key to the success of Linking the
Landscape are people from the
residential areas of Thatcham, Newbury
and surrounding villages, who are
enjoying making stronger connections
with the wonderful wild spaces on their
doorsteps.
The popular events at Thatcham
Community Orchard, including our recent
noisy wassail and last autumn’s harvest
celebrations, attract huge crowds.
Children are fascinated by the natural
world; they instinctively love it and want
to know more.
At the Nature Discovery Centre in
Thatcham, we help children from
toddlers to teenagers discover nature
in ways that feed their curiosity, excite
their imaginations and enable them to
understand the importance of wildlife for
us all.
I am very proud of the Teen Rangers
who recently received their John Muir
Discovery Award.
It’s great to see young people with a real
passion and enthusiasm for looking after
nature. Any of them could be the next
Chris Packham or David Attenborough
because Teen Rangers gives them an
outlet for taking real, practical action for
nature while having a bit of fun at the
same time.
Find out more on Wildlife Clubs page at
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