During the course of any one year, the Great Fen is pleased to welcome many groups of visitors. We are a popular destination!

In October last year, staff from the Somerset Wildlife Trust joined representatives from many other conservation organisations, farmers, landowners and academics, in the Great Fen. The group was organised by Natural England, part of a three day tour of East Anglian wetlands including sites managed by the RSPB (Lakenheath) and National Trust (Wicken Fen).

Great Fen staff welcomed the group to Corney’s Barn where a presentation on the Great Fen was given and our guests were able to enjoy fascinating displays, including peat cores taken by Dr Steve Boreham, provided by Henry Stanier (Great Fen Monitoring and Research Officer). We then visited the paludiculture beds at Engine Farm, the Holme Posts, and Holme Fen NNR.

In return, members of the Great Fen team were invited to visit the Somerset Levels and in mid-November we took the second of our autumn study visits (Read Kate's Dutch Diary here). Lorna and I were joined by our new colleague, Reserves Officer Jasmin Atkinson, who was just in her first week of starting work with the WTBCN. Welcome to the team, Jasmin!

Our first port of call was the Somerset WT’s Honeygar Farm reserve. Here we met Simon Clarke, Head of Nature Recovery, Somerset Wildlife Trust (SWT) who gave a general introduction to the Somerset Levels Super National Nature Reserve, and Sian Russell (SWT) who gave an overview of the Peat Partnership work in Somerset.

We then enjoyed a walking tour of the beautiful site, stopping off to talk to SWT’s Jane Brookhouse, Paul Tansley and Trevor Ward. They gave a fascinating overview of the ‘Adapting the Levels’ ELMS Landscape Recovery Project, including their work with farmers and opportunities for Green Finance.

Lorna and I were struck with the high-level water carriers, familiar of course to us in the Fens, but very different as regards bank height! Call that a high-level water carrier?

Joe Hampson (SWT) spoke to us about the monitoring work at Honeygar Farm. Like the Great Fen, it has a full suite of biotic (species) and non-biotic monitoring, including GHG flux, water levels, water quality, and peat height. During Joe’s talk, starlings began to muster for the evening murmuration, which, as dusk approached, took on mass and urgency. Our final talk was from Steve Mewes (SWT) who told us about the commercial peat extraction still going on next to Honeygar, a depressing counterpoint to the uplifting spectacle of the murmuration. The day ended at Glastonbury for a shared meal and where the group stayed overnight.

Next morning, more weather, thankfully not the 37° of the Netherlands visit, but good old British rain. In quantity. And at length! Onwards and upwards to RSPB Greylake to meet Conservation Officer Damon Bridge for a walk around this beautiful reserve.  Here we had discussions around the rewetting of site, its water management, and particularly on the developing work there on paludiculture (wet farming). From our Great Fen point of view, the site had enviable amounts of water (albeit some of it falling vertically!) and a relatively straightforward water management regime, but still posed interesting challenges.

We moved on to Natural England’s Avalon Marshes Centre shared by Somerset Wildlife Trust and Natural England (NE), for a welcome sandwich lunch, and then a short walk to the wonderful Shapwick Heath NNR. Here, 500ha of wetland has been created from land formerly dug for commercial peat extraction. Louise Treneman (NE) gave us an update on peat restoration work. At Shapwick, NE has been using a method of peat restoration more commonly used in peat uplands, called cell bunding. This creates a mosaic of small bunded areas which are easier to re-wet and to manage water levels on than large expanses. It has developed into a truly impressive wetland habitat, rich in wildlife and accessible to the public. The restoration has taken place in phases so the visitor is able to get a good sense of “before” and “after”, with areas of wet woodland still seen.

It has been so interesting to have visited the landscape of the polders in the Netherlands and that of the Somerset Levels within a short space of time.  Resonances between the two were apparent and the issues both areas face are in many respects common to those we face and work to overcome in the Great Fen. Sharing knowledge and expertise, the goal of both autumn study visits, can help us to meet the challenges to make more wet places in which wildlife can thrive, inspirational places for people to enjoy and get close to nature, where we can fight climate change, and where people can create sustainable livings from the land.