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Welcome to the Waresley and Gransden
Woods website
This website is dedicated to providing
information on all topics relating to the Waresley and Gransden Woods reserves of
The Wildlife
Trust for Bedfordshire, Cambridgeshire and Northamptonshire.
For directions to visit the reserve follow this link.
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Life in Lockdown #3
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25/01/2021 - we have not visited the woods since the start of
lockdown number 3 on the 26th December, as we live too far
away. Hence no further conservation work has taken place and
no updates posted either. Fortunately we are able to walk into
the countryside from St Ives, floods permitting. It was during
one of our recent daily exercise walks that we came the closest I've
ever been to an otter. And I managed to get a fairly decent
photo as well, which I'm sharing below.
On my last visit the reserve
was closed due to the extremely wet conditions. As far as I'm
aware, this is still the case. Brownes' Pieces remains open.
Stay safe and respect social distancing
while visiting - Graham.
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20/12/2020 - a much drier coppicing session today with a clear blue
sky for most of our visit. This time we were working at the
far end of the section, shown in the pic below. Started off by
cutting back the stools and processing the brash left from last
week's session. Then we continued to remove hazel from along the ride side
edge. Though we have made good progress in the last few
sessions quite a bit of work remains to be done here. For
the moment the reserve remains closed, with Trust signage showing
how damage and loss of flora has been caused in the past by these type of
conditions. Brownes' Pieces remains open.
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13/12/2020 - a very wet coppicing session today, although to be fair
we had seen the forecast. A great deal achieved with two
chainsaws in operation. Many thanks for your assistance and
company David, I hope you didn't take too long to dry out. I
have started removing the hazel stools along the ride side edge, so
the full extent of the new scallop will soon be visible.
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06/12/2020 - we made our first visit back to the woods after
lockdown 2 this morning. The foggy conditions showed the trees
at their atmospheric best and also made for an interesting drive as
well. The reserve remains closed to the public due to the
water-logged state of the paths and rides.
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Conservation
work parties have been temporarily suspended due to tier four travel
restrictions
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Last Conservation Update
21/12/2020
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The coppice section shown above is
being cleared as we remove vegetation. Last cut in 2008 it contains a good
selection of large hazel stools. Click here
or the on the image to open my 2020 conservation work flickr album to see our progress so far.
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