Return of the dark knights!

Open door to bat cave

Another wet day forecast but a sunny start with the arrival of Morris [Bat trust] who together with Mike were all set for the spring bat count at Sherborne. I assumed my duties as safety man as we set out to the quarry roost. Expectation were that there shouldn't be more than 20 or so lesser horseshoes in the winter roost but the reality turned out very differently. Mike and Morris entered the Quarry bat residence first to do the official count. Didn't believe Mike as he reappeared with his clip board announcing 130 bats still in residence with one cluster of 96!  Morris meanwhile stayed in the cave to allow me to see for myself and sure enough 130 bats were happily hanging from the cave ceilings. It confirms how sensible bats are since  there was no good reason to leave a comfortable 10 degrees in the winter roost for the lower temperatures we have been experiencing so far outside. Only absentee was the single greater horseshoe bat that was present at the winter count {may have returned to the mansion roost at Woodchester}. Having completed this roost count we moved on to the other winter roost sites and the final bat count rose to 169, nearly a record which is good news for bats at Sherborne. Only problem remaining is that Mike and Morris would like to do some  'rennovations' in the quarry roost site, so they are hoping the outside temperatures rise soon to encourage the  Quarry  bats to move to their summer roost sites thereby allowing the work to start.

As the weather continued to be obliging I spent the afternoon with Mike in the East belt completing the deer fencing around a new compartment Mike, with volunteer Simon, had already made a good start on. More woodland management, this time [following appropriate thinning in the winter]  to ensure healthy growth of young saplings, so yet again foiling the local deer population. This time no drival  {or gripples} as Mike had already got the posts set in the ground with expert use of his tractor! But wasn't deprived of use of monkey strainers, myti strainer, pig ring gun, high tensile deer fencing , hammer and staples. Most demanding aspect of this construction was joining up the different sections of deer fencing {3 in all} which was especially fiddly even for Mike! Anyway job completed before any serious rain and not a bad days work all round.

Odds and sods...

Bibury, view Arlington row

Almost a non starter in the countryside today, forecast dismal, and early showers didn't bode well. Against his better judgement Martin voted to give it a go and  we set off to Bibury for a couple of small tasks. Weather surprisingly good, made me feel good, but obviously not the pole saw which wouldn't run, so the cherry tree missed out on a 'short back and sides'. All was not lost since we cleared up some willow we coppiced earlier in the year and had a quick look around Rack Isle surveying  trees and the 'drying out' water courses.

Packs a punch, 'king hitter'

Next stop was Clump farm to deliver some hefty gate posts to the contractors [The 'Shaun' and Martin] putting in  new boundary fencing.  Got my first close up and personal look at the 'king hitter' in action as it pounded in one of the strainer posts in less than 2 minutes. Hardly fair I thought since my last experience at manually putting in posts of this size was 1 hour plus! Since the weather was still looking good Martin and I moved down the hill to move a sizeable tree which had fallen onto the NT fence line from an adjoining property. No simple job and slightly frustrating since this should have been done by the landowner but sometimes apparently you have to suck it up! Ended a varied day by blocking up 2 previously felled ash trees which were duly delivered to Sherborne with the much promised showers finally arriving.

High tension in Littleworth wood

Its been a while but was back again in the semi natural ancient woodland of Littleworth nestling on the hills which look down on Snowshill.   Over the winter quite a bit of thinning and coppicing had been carried out in a selected area of the wood. Also  management of  scrub growth in the rides was done so as to encourage habitat diversity of the woodland. This is a continuation of good woodland management carried out by Martin over the years coupled with the creation of a number of protected 'compartments' {with ~5 year life cycle} and upkeep of woodland boundary fencing/walls. The job this week with Martin was to build a new compartment with deer fencing around the prepared area to both benefit plant & wild life and as a by product eventually provide good quality hazel. The advantages of setting up compartments is evident by the healthy plant growth in existing compartments. This stems from having a more open canopy which provides more light intensity for ground plants, protection of young plant growth from hungry deer or clumsy humans and preservation of dead wood for habitat diversity {insects especially!}.

early purple orchid

deer fence in construction

wood anemones

Anyway back to the job in hand, we arrived in the wood heavily armed with some of my favourite tools: the monkey strainer, the drival, gripples, the mighty metal pole and a really heavy coil of high tensile wire for the two wires to support the deer fencing. The 26 fence poles and fencing were already on site so all we needed was some decent weather and a careful eye on the spring plants carpeting the compartment area ie. didn't want my big feet crushing the wood anemones, primroses, emerging bluebells , Herb Paris, Ransoms, Tway Blade orchid,  early purple orchids. 


Soon discovered that when uncoiling high tensile wire you can easily let it get out of control and then stress levels mount as you try and untangle  it. Good news is that there is a technique to lay it out flat over long lengths, but can't reveal such ranger dark arts here! Having laid out the ground wire, applying tension to it with the monkey strainers,  we got down to positioning the poles and defining the compartment area. Further good news was the ground wasn't as rocky as Sherborne! but 20 plus fixed poles later energy levels were depleted. Up to this point the weather had been perfect and the predicted rain/snow hadn't made an appearance. Unfortunately as we prepared to install the top wire late afternoon the heavens opened and the days work brought  to a close. 




After having such good weather with Martin I shouldn't have been surprised as I set out for a day with Mike at Sherborne to encounter a mini snowstorm but amazingly as I neared Sherborne the weather once more improved. So instead of facing near arctic conditions I was soon overheating as I tackled the first job of the day splitting wood from the recently restocked wood piles in the nursery area. The afternoon was spent planting  more ash saplings where I rediscovered more stony ground which needed to be penetrated to receive the ash roots. Once more Maddie, Mike's springer,  proved to be of no help and even worse I learnt not to trust the usually sound advice from Mike that 'the soil should be easier to dig here!'.