SinCH has put our connection to nature at the centre of our activities this year. We have run 5 nature-based activities so far and it’s great that around 90 residents have joined in these events. It has been lovely to see so many families with young kids joining in with us.
We have been asked to give a flavour of these events so those who couldn’t attend can still be in the loop.
We also have two more autumn activities planned so watch out for further details.
Winter months
We started the year with Bird Box making event at the Memorial Hall and over 20 boxes were built for people’s gardens or to be sited around the Parish. We’d like to thank the Staffordshire Wildlife Trust for supplying the kits at a reduced cost and the Parish Council for purchasing them for us. 20 people attended and enjoyed the physical therapy of wielding hammers! It was certainly one of our noisiest and vibrant events which we will look to repeat in 2025.
Spring
In April we ran an I-Naturalist phone App tutorial followed by a walk in Great Haywood.
The App allows you to identify a wide range of flora and fauna so it is a great way of getting close to nature and also helps us build a picture of wildlife and plants we have locally.
The feedback from attendees was very positive and being able to name something is really important way of getting on first name terms. Once you start using the app you find that you start to notice things much more and it’s great for kids of all ages.
For more info about the I-Naturalist App and what we are doing with it please see the SinCH website here.
Also check out our local Help Nature Thrive i-Naturalist project which has over 5,500 observations and 880 species so far.
Summer
Over the summer we have run three walks/events. Firstly at the unique Chartley Moss, a Bee Safari and a Bat Walk. The last two have raised £100 in donations which has been split equally between the Bumble Bee Conservation Trust and the Staffordshire Bat Group.
At all three events we were lucky to have local experts who were happy to share their knowledge and insight with us. So many thanks to Paul and Jenny the Natural England Rangers responsible for Chartley Moss, Ron for sharing his extensive knowledge of bees and Jane for sharing her expertise and insight on our local bats. Much appreciated!
Chartley Moss
Chartley Moss is a National Nature Reserve and the largest example of a “Quaking Peat Bog”, or Schwingmoor, in Britain. It is privately owned but leased and managed by Natural England.
PLEASE NOTE due to dangerous nature of the site access is only allowed by permit or guided tour.
We were expertly guided by the Rangers Paul and Jenny who explained that the site was damaged in Victorian times by drainage schemes designed to bring the “waste” into agricultural use. Natural England are now working to undo this by blocking up the outlets and already they can see the tree line receding as the land is re-wetted.
The whole site extends over 100 hectares and it’s been there for around for 3000 years. The peat is up to 3 metres thick and is topped by a range of plants especially sphagnum and other mosses, cotton grass and carnivorous Sundew plants. The peat sits on about 30 feet of water which has accumulated in two hollow rock basins measuring around 800m x 300m). There are a number of open ponds where the peat has receded and new ones can open up at fairly short notice.
So we didn’t get too close to the edges and the sensation of around a dozen people (gently) bouncing up and down on the “quaking bog” was a very strange, if not disconcerting experience!
The site is a haven for invertebrates and around 1,200 species have so far been found. The site is noted for a rare red-listed species the White-faced Darter, one of seven places it is found in the Midlands. Unfortunately, due to a lack of sun we missed them this time. We did, however, find some very pretty Darter remains. With so many Dragonflies and Damselflies on the reserve it is a favourite haunt of the Hobby which only eats insects and small birds.
For some more photos of the reserve see here.
We are hoping to run this walk again to accommodate those who couldn’t attend due to the change of date caused by heavy rains in June.
Bee Safari
Around a dozen people joined us on a sunny afternoon for the second SinCH Bee Safari led by our friend Ron. We had great fun at the Wildlife Trust’s HQ at Wolseley Bridge safely getting up close and personal with a wide range of bees and other insects.
There are over 270 different species of bee in the UK! These bees can be split into three groups: honeybees, bumblebees and solitary bees. There is 1 species of honeybee, 24 species of bumblebee, and all the rest are solitary bees.
We started with an overview of the species we were most likely to see. Many species of bumblebee are very scarce or restricted to specific areas of the country.
Also, different species appear and disappear at different times of the year. For example, the Early bumblebee (Bombus pratorum) is more active in spring and early summer and are less likely to be seen from mid-summer. Queens are most commonly seen in spring and late summer when they may be resting or feeding.
In contrast, workers are much busier as they collect pollen and nectar and are usually seen flying quickly from flower to flower. Male Bumblebees don’t collect pollen so they won’t have any bulging sacks.
All of this, and more, helps narrow the identification options down.
We were all given a personal copy of the BumbleBee Conservation Trust Spotters Guide and we built up our knowledge about how to differentiate between the species.
There are three main bumblebee tail colours: white/buff, red/orange and ginger/yellow. The banding pattern can consist of one, two or three bands over the thorax and or the abdomen. Bands can vary in both strength of colour and thickness.
The Common Carder Bee is the only UK species with all-brown colouring and no white tail. They range from ginger to a pale, sandy brown, depending on how sun-bleached they are.
Ron was able to catch bees in special containers so they could be checked out up close before returning them before they got too stressed. Some of the differences are quite subtle, so the difference between a male Buff Tailed Bee and a White Tailed Bee is that the latter has a small white band on the tail.
Given the unusual weather it’s been a bad year for bees but amongst the species identified were:
- White-tailed Bumblebee
- Buff-tailed Bumblebee
- Cuckoo Bumblebee
- Tapered Drone Flies
For me the most interesting insect spotted was a European Scorpion Fly!
For more on how to identify bees check out the Bumblebee Conservation Trust website here.
Bat Walk
Over 25 people turned up for our first ever SinCH Bat Walk, again at the Wolesley Centre. Jane welcomed us, distributed bat detectors amongst us and explained that there are known to be
17 bat species breeding in the UK and that in Staffordshire we have 9.
Before it got fully dark we were lucky enough to be able to spend time watching two of the most common species – Common Pipestrelles and Soprano Pippistrelles leaving their roosts in the roof space above the Cafe area. Soprano Pippistrelles were only identified as a separate species in 1990s due to a higher frequency of echolocation. These are the smallest bats at 35-45 mm and if you have a bat circling your house or flying through your alleyway it is likely to be a Pipistrelle.
The bats don’t all leave the roost at once or by the same route – this tactic reduces the chances of predation by owls.
Although we heard a Tawny Owl or two throughout the walk we didn’t spot any incidents.
As the sky darkened we walked along the boardwalk by the River Trent in search of Daubenton’s Bats, a medium sized bat of about 45-55mm. This species flies above and very close to water in order to feed on insects which they catch using their feet or their tail. Using the Bat Detectors we were able to hear the Daubentons around and about. Jane explained that bat species have their own distinct sound within the detector as well as a different frequency. Pips are to be found around the 50 Mhz range on the dial.
Jane and Ron set up torches across the lake so we could see the Daubentons zooming around in search of midges, caddisflies, mayflies and the like.
Using the bat detectors we were also able to detect a Noctule Bat, one of the largest at around 60-82mm. These can be found via the bat detector at 20 to 45kHz and they fly higher and faster above the tree line so we weren’t able to see one that night.
After about an hour and a half we made our way back to the car park to disperse having had a fine time. The kids particularly enjoyed the Bat Detectors as the noises they make made everything so much more real. A decent Bat Detector will set you back around £80 but well worth the investment!
These last two events have raised £100 in donations which has been split equally between the Bumble Bee Conservation Trust and the Staffordshire Bat Group.
Autumn Green Walks
We have some more walks planned for the autumn – the ever popular Fungi Foray will be held again in mid-October (date to be confirmed) and we will doing a hedgehog-themed ramble on Sunday 27th October – further details on both to follow!
We are also hoping to support Shugborough with volunteers to help seed their new wildflower meadow and to help with the development work for their new Woodland Pasture Management project. Further details to follow on these events too.
Want to be in the loop or to get more involved?
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