If you attended our Wildlife Trust AGM and Members’ Day last month, or caught up on the recording of the talks given that day, you will have seen my report on what great things we can expect from Peatland Progress, our Lottery-funded project that many of you may have supported yourself, as part of the appeal to purchase Speechly’s Farm.

We have had many successes in recent years to build on, with new species colonising and breeding, as well as species breeding more widely, within the Great Fen. These successes have continued with marsh harriers breeding on the restoration land for a second year and with an increase in the number of pairs of breeding stonechats; some returning from last year and more chicks fledged this year. In the case of the returning birds, individuals such as the male, RED /RED (so called because he has a red ring on each leg), have appeared on the same farm again. Thanks to our colour ringing programme, we have been able to observe him from a distance, while he and his mate reared three broods.

Our surveys of the glow-worms culminated in the first ‘glow-worm walk’ at New Decoy, bringing together aspects of monitoring & research and public engagement. The Great Fen hope to offer more of these walks next year. You can learn more about the wildlife of the Great Fen next year, as part of our Wildlife Training Workshop programme. This includes the topic of geology, with Dr Steve Boreham. Steve is an ecological geologist and volunteers at the Great Fen, helping us to integrate three key aspects of the Fen’s conservation; its geology, the hydrology, and the wildlife habitats.

As I explained in my Members’ Day talk, as with restoration work elsewhere, we hope to create a mosaic of habitats, ranging from new water bodies and wet ditches to wet grassland and similar fen habitats. In addition, there will be reedbed and scrub, and also those habitats provided by the next stage in our wet farming (paludicultural habitats).

The ‘wildlife winners’ include many different groups of wildlife, with some species well know to be the favourites of our visitors, staff and volunteers at the Great Fen. These are just a few examples; marginal plants (marsh sow thistle), aquatic plants (water violet), egrets and waterfowl (bittern), reedbed birds (marsh harrier, grasshopper warbler, cuckoo), small mammals (barbastelle bat, Daubenton’s bat, harvest mouse, water vole & water shrew), plovers and waders (lapwing, jacksnipe, snipe & woodcock), amphibians & reptiles (common toad, great crested newt & grass snake), fish (spined loach), invertebrates (great green bush-cricket, scarce chaser dragonfly, king diving beetle & tansy beetle).

As Lorna Parker (Great Fen Restoration Manager) has said, the purchase of Speechly’s Farm is a real game changer, filling in a vital piece of the jigsaw by finally joining together the two national nature reserves of Holme Fen and Woodwalton Fen. Woodwalton Fen was the private nature reserve of Charles Rothschild during the 1900s; his wild retreat, where he may well have developed his plans to create the Society for the Promotion of Nature Reserves, an organisation we now know as the Wildlife Trusts.

Imagine Charles Rothschild, pioneer of nature conservation, transported forward in time. He gazes out from his land at Woodwalton watching hobbies chasing dragonflies above him and hears bitterns booming out from the depths of the reedbeds, as kingfishers plunge into crystal clear waters to hunt sticklebacks.

As you may have read in our sightings, right now merlins skim across the surface of the fields, bitterns stalk along the narrow ditch margins and barn owls glide, silently, over the fields at night; so the initial signs for the future are most favourable.

As always, volunteers are an integral part of the team delivering all this conservation work. 60 volunteers, the 'Great Fen Monitors', help to carry out the programme of ecological monitoring at the Fen and this results in a magnificent contribution from the local community. These dedicated, long-term volunteers, have included two who received well-deserved recognition this year, Andy Frost and Suzy Boys.

Andy has been a volunteer at the Great Fen for over 12 years now. As a member of the local community, he is also a useful source of local knowledge and is always willing to go that extra mile to help cover surveys when other volunteers cannot attend. This was especially valuable during the COVID-19 crisis when he would carry out several surveys in a single week.

Andy regularly carries out a variety of surveys at the Great Fen; for birds, bats, raptors, butterflies and dragonflies, moths, glow-worms, and also for plants, the focus of one of his first surveys in 2011. Andy has a particular interest in birds, dragonflies and moths, reflected in his choice of award prizes, books on the ‘Life Cycles of British & Irish Butterflies’ by Peter Eeles, ‘Extraordinary Insects’ by Anne Sverdrup-Thygeson, and ‘The Wryneck’ by Gerard Gorman. 

I first met Andy, 30 year ago, as volunteers pursuing our love of dragonflies but why did Andy start volunteering at the Great Fen?  He said, “I got involved with volunteering at the Great Fen because I am fascinated by the history of the Fens and how they used to be. So, I thought it would be good to get involved with monitoring and help with the Great Fen rewilding project, and to see its development while contributing.”

Andy received the Oliver Rackham Award, which recognises outstanding service to wildlife in Bedfordshire, Cambridgeshire or Northamptonshire, through conservation, monitoring or research.

Suzy has had a big impact in a relatively short period of time, by volunteering regularly across all three counties covered by our Wildlife Trust, taking part in many types of activity. In terms of the Great Fen, she has thrown herself into a wide range of surveys, from harvest mouse nest searches to colour-ringing stonechats.

She received the Richenda Huxley Award, which recognises an outstanding contribution to any aspect of the work of the Trust. As her prizes, Suzy chose three Collins Guides, on butterflies, birds and wildflowers, and also the ‘Field Guide to the Dragonflies and Damselflies of Great Britain and Ireland’ by Steve Cham.

Suzy has volunteered on many reserves, not just at the Great Fen; Her 'conservation diary' for a single week can see her leading a hand in our woodlands, wetlands and grasslands. She said, “It's given me a fabulous opportunity, I have always wanted to be involved in nature, and volunteering has provided that. It's an absolute privilege to be able to learn and work with the staff who are so dedicated and knowledgeable. It's been a real pleasure and I want to give a huge thank you to Henry for his tuition and support.”

Congratulations to all of this year's award winners; I've had the pleasure of working with most of them over the years, whether they have volunteered at the Great Fen, such as Caroline Lewis, or elsewhere.

I hope both Andy and Suzy will continue as part of the monitoring team at the Great Fen, on our journey of restoration, and enjoy the progress that will be made over the next five years, and beyond, witnessing the wildlife colonising, diversifying, establishing and multiplying in the Great Fen.

Henry Stanier (Great Fen Monitoring & Research Officer)