Coln 'LWD' capers and a second 'Dark knight' ?

Good starting point , 11century Saxon church Coln Rogers

Modest dwelling of our host, Coln Rogers

Emma points out earlier  Coln river bank improvements

Team 2, Deflectors with fascine/stakes and LWD with 'metal rod fix'

Completed deflectors in even faster moving river

Team 1 starting build point on river Coln

Fascine construction taking shape downstream of bridge, Team 1

Joined GWT today for my first visit to Coln Rogers to carry out some LWD { large wooded debris } and fascine deflector construction on  the river Coln to improve river flow in support of healthy fish stock.  The site upstream of Coln Rogers  and close to Coln St Denis is strong competition for 'scenic wonder' to last weeks site at Brassey. It was a pretty large team and required Richard, John and Emma {plus 2 who I didn't know} from GWT to organise us all. The first job was to ensure the fascines, metal rods, stakes and assorted tools were transported to the various locations on the river Coln where we would be building the Deflectors. There was a 3 main areas of working, hence 3 teams. One concentrated upstream by the bridge to construct a Deflector/bank reshaper using stakes and fascines, the second was positioned downstream of this to construct further deflectors using LWD and fascines on the opposite bank and the third placed further downstream {past a second bridge} carrying out some 'unshading' and pleaching work {another deflector approach}.  Yet again the weather was kind but we had to be even more careful than last week because of the deep, fast moving river conditions. Fortunately no-one was swept away, whilst I was there, and with rapidly dwindling material supplies some significant work was achieved.

Spent Wednesday helping out on the March bat count at Sherborne with Mike and Paul { an expert from ' way up North'}. Paul has been providing some high tech gadgets which have helped identify different bat species/data in the various roosts around Sherborne, all contributing to the BBC spring watch etc. programme of work. Unfortunately our number one Dark knight, Maurice, couldn't make the session so Paul's attendance was helpful for  number of reasons. Interestingly the audio recording gear he setup has shown more bat species have been visiting 'our' lesser horseshoe bat dominated roosts than I/we realised eg. pipistrelles, natterers, whiskered and long eared brown. They are probably small in number but difficult to spot as they squeeze into crevices and hide in out of the way places. The March 'observable' count was 177 Bat cave, 5 Kennels, 7 Bothy and 11 Cellar giving a total of 200 lesser horseshoe bats {March 2017 was 188, shame our test cricket  couldn't reach this total, we won't mention the rugby!}. Temperature outside the mine was over 12 degrees C and 8-9 C inside. All in all good to see the count reach 200 and also for Paul to see a healthy population of lesser horseshoes who don't reside {or at least not seen by Paul} in the frozen North!

Can't see 'the water for the trees'

Dense patch of shading on Windrush

Downstream water vole heaven

Initial cuts reveal clear water

Joined GWT at one of my favourite sites today at Brassey on a stretch of the river Windrush  dividing the Hill and Aston farms. John led the team, on a 'remove the shading' task to please the water voles,  downstream of the Brassey reserve. This was a continuation of the work carried out on a stretch of the river Windrush  which included the watercress beds. Given the water levels waders was the order of the day for most of us plus an ability to clear the barb wire fence protecting the riverside from cattle erosion. On Gold cup day at Cheltenham we were blessed with some fine, warm sunny weather. Although previous work had cleared long stretches of overhanging branches the 3 man team I joined had a stretch which was pretty dense. With saw in hand I waded out to attack the willow overshading the water and in spite of a lengthy layoff from this physical work I soon got into a rhythm and gradually made a dent  in the branches revealing the water underneath. It was satisfying to get my feet wet again in one of the river systems here in the Cotswolds. As a bonus the waders I used were free of leaks and the only slight negative was the trudge back up the hilly slope where we had parked the cars.