Dunscar Wood: Balsam Bash

Sunday 1st June 2025

Dunscar Wood is a relatively new woodland near Egerton, Bolton. The wood occupies 5.7 hectares of what was formerly green fields which were bought by the Woodland Trust in 1998 as part of their millennial Woodlands on Your Doorstep project. Old maps do show a small patch of woods in the area but not of any great size or significance. You can find other posts about the work we’ve done at Dunscar here and here.

Today’s task was a different aspect of woodland management form planting and thinning. Instead of managing the trees themselves we were managing what grows between them, in this case Himalayan balsam. You can find out more about balsam and why we spend so much time getting rid of it on yet another post (sorry) here.

For the last couple of years we have been trying to reduce the presence of balsam, and it looks like we are actually succeeding to some extent; the areas that last year were thick with balsam are now a bit more sparse, but work still needs to continue. This session, however, was cut short by heavy rain.

Thanks to Caroline and Tom for organising, and for all of the other work they but into running the group. Also thanks to everyone who turned.

Jumbles: Pond Restoration

Pond Restoration 4th May 2025

As well as a big reservoir Jumbles Country Park also has some smaller water bodies that are less well known. In May 2022 we began a restoration project, back then the ponds had become overgrown and shaded out by vegetation. The ponds were dredged to remove leaf litter and silt and oxygenating plants were introduced to the ponds. Brash and branches were cut back and used to create linear habitat piles, Himalayan balsam was pulled up or cut down.

In May 2023 we came back and the areas around the ponds had transformed from a lunar landscape to a carpet of flowers, the work continued with cutting back invasive vegetation, and planting marginal plants.. and a bit of pond dipping. Today’s task involved cutting back willow from around the pond to let in more light. We used the chipper to process most of the brash and spread the resulting chips along the path, the rest of the brash was used to create a linear habitat pile. Want to know more about ponds? Then have a read of this.

In 2023 we found toad tadpoles, this year we had alder fly larvae and baby newts. The ponds should continue to attract frogs and toads as well as insects such as dragonflies. Thanks to everyone involved and big thanks to Tom and Caroline for organising and keeping the group going.

Easter Task

20th April 2025 – Grimeford Village, Dry Stone Walling

This years hard boiled Easter task was actually on the day itself – Easter Sunday. Because it’s a popular day for family stuff etc our numbers were a bit down on usual task numbers, but we did get half a dozen or so egg-ceptional wallers turning up to continue the wall along side Lower Rivington Reservoir.

For those who don’t know much about walling it’s a bit like a 3D jigsaw, or Tetris, and involves putting one stone on top of another to build a stable non-wobbly wall. First we took down anything unstable and made lines (or piles) of stones of similar size, then we started building. The wall has two tapering outer skins, with big stones generally at the bottom, smaller ones as you build up. Every so often adding a through stone which acts as a wall tie, any gaps are filled with smaller bits which is called hearting. The top of the wall is finished with coping stone.

With it being Easter we had the traditional BCV Egg Hunt, 14 mini eggs were hidden by Craig, and just after lunch time we we all set out to find them.

Thanks to Caroline and Tom for organising, Jane for shelling out for the eggs, and everyone you made it a cracking task.

Happy Easter from BCV

Moses Gate: Tree Planting

6th April 2025 Moses Gate Tree Planting

Our first task of April and we’re back at Moses Gate Country Park planting trees. We’ve planted nearby areas on Halloween 2022 and Easter 2023 and today’s session extends the planted area and also replaces some of the previously planted trees that have failed.

There’s no mystery to planting trees: you dig a hole, put the tree in it, put in a small stake for support and a tree shelter to stop deer and shrews nibbling it to death. Trees are planted a few feet apart and then grow as nature intended. There’s a bit more about tree planting on a previous post which you can read on this link.

Thanks to Tom and Caroline for organising (thank you for your leadership, as they say) and every one else who turned up.

Darcy Lever Marshes: New Frontier

Pond Management 9th March 2025

Darcy Lever Marshes is a new site for Bolton Conservation volunteers. The site is hidden between housing estates near Hollycroft Avenue, playing fields and Radcliffe road and if one of Bolton’s secret wildlife havens.

The marshes provide habitat for great crested newt and other amphibians, and potentially could benefit dragonflies. About 20 years ago Dave Orchard and the Amphibian and Reptile Group for South Lancashire developed the site but willow trees are now starting to take over and threatening the site’s usefulness, a process know as succession (to find out more about succession see this earlier post).

We were last here in November 2023 when BCV and Dave Orchard removed willow trees that shading ponds deeper in the marshes. As this is privately owned land we had permission to burn all of the material we cut down, on this particular site this method of disposal was preferable to making habitat piles.

This time we were working on a different pond. Trees were shading out the pond and needed cutting back, the brash produced was used to create a linear habitat pile along one edge of the pond to deter intruders

Many thanks to the site’s owner for allowing us to work on this site, Tom and Caroline for organising and everyone who took part. Photos from both tasks below.

Doffcocker Lodge: Willow Tit Conservation

23rd February 2025

This task was carried out with the Wildlife Trust for Lancashire, Greater Manchester and Merseyside, as it’s a bit of a long name we’ll just call them Wildlife Trust for short. We’ve work with the Trust previously on willow tit conservation, that time it was Darcy Lever Gravel Pits using techniques devised by the Trust’s Dr Mark Champion. We also used the same methods at Moses Gate Country Park. This time we’re at Doffcocker Lodge Country Park.

Willow tits have been present at Doffcocker, to some degree, for a number of years but not in any significant numbers. Willow tit’s, including sub-species, have an extensive range covering Europe and other sub-arctic areas with estimated numbers of 175-253 million. However, since the 1970s the population sizes of these birds in the UK has fallen by around 83% and were Red-listed in in 2022. Habitat deterioration is thought to be the main cause of these changes; competition from other similar species and predation could also be a factor.

A couple of months ago we began prepping at area of the lodge in anticipation of the project getting underway, but unfortunately other circumstances meant the main part of the work had to be delayed.

So, what does willow tit conservation involve? Willow tit’s like to create nest holes in rotten trees in wet willow carr and fen like habitats. But there aren’t enough rotten trees around for them. To give them a hand we took some old, dead branches and attached them to living trees, partly burying the ends of the branches in the ground. Over time the attached branches will rot and soften and the willow tits will be able to excavate nest holes in them. The photo at the top of the page shows a willow tit and the nest it created at Doffcocker a few years ago.

We also did some dead hedgeing, and some tree planting on this task.

Thanks to Emma and Phil of the Wildlife Trust and to everyone who took part.