A Kiss Under The Mistletoe?

Lions Laurie and Jim

Thanks to the Fleet Lions, there will be plenty of opportunities to steal a kiss this Christmas! 

Lions Laurie and Jim have been on a mission to deepest Somerset to harvest an orchard of festive fun and returned with a bumper crop! 

They have kindly donated their yeild of mistletoe to the Fleet Pond Society – so if you want to liven up your Christmas, come along to the Hart Shopping Centre in Fleet on Saturday, 19^th December and purchase a sprig or two. 

We will be outside the old Woolies from 9am to 4.30pm, with not only plenty of mistletoe, but a selection of Fleet Pond merchandise, including our new range of four postcards featuring some beautiful photographs of the pond. 

There will also be the opportunity to order from a range of clothing decorated with the stylish Fleet Pond Nature Reserve logo.   

Lion Laurie

Photo credits: Jim Storey

Volunteer Event This Sunday, 13 December

Colin Gray writes:

“I have decided to relocate the 13th December task to the Link Glade which is creating a heathland link between the Dry Heath, around the car park, and the small open space we call the Green.  It is called the Green because it is the last remnant of the Army Golf Course that once lay between here and the Bramshot Bridge over the railway line.

Nearest rendezvous point for anyone who does not wish to come to the Workshop will be the reserve car park.  The soil is dry enough for strong boots rather than wellies but watch out for bramble which is a bit of a problem and needs to be removed with the birch.  Please do not fell the gorse as this provides excellent breeding shrubs for long-tailed tits.  There is some gorse by the footpath to the picnic site that has become tall and “leggy” which might benefit from coppicing but the rest should be left.”

Further details on the volunteer event schedule and related matters can be found here.

More Tips For The Photo Competition!

A Photography Hide Recently Spotted At Fleet Pond

The deadline for this year’s FPS Photography Competition is fast approaching – 31 December 2009!

This year’s categories are:

• Work or Play
• Sunrise or Sunset
• Birds

There are many web sites that offer helpful tips on all aspects of photography. Bearing the competition categories in mind, you might find the following sites helpful (tips for sunrise/sunsets have already been given here):

General: The Photo Tips And Techniques site from Kodak is exceptionally well designed and covers all aspects.

People: There are 30 tips for photographing people here and 19 portrait photography tutorials here.

Birds:  Photographing birds is very tricky! There are 5 steps for getting great bird photos here. The box at the bottom of the right hand sidebar of this blog gives links to some impressive photos taken at Fleet Pond (most are of birds). To get photos of this quality it’s often necessary to use a hide (as above).

We wish you much success with your photography and we’re looking forward to your creative submissions!

Photo credit: Michelle Salter

Mudlarks At The Pond

Andy Wells, assisted by his fellow Mudlarks, writes:

On 7^th and 8^th November, Fleet Pond was once again visited by the “Mudlarks” (a name given to them over a number of years of visiting Fleet Pond). Known to themselves as “The Hedgehogs”, the group’s members are all graduates of Southampton University and former members of Southampton University Conservation Volunteers (SUCV). Since graduating, the former students now work in a wide variety of fields including Environment, Transport Planning, Electronics, Computing, Coastal Management and Education, to name some of their diverse professions.

After graduating, members of the group spread out from Southampton to a number of areas of the country including: Essex, Newbury, Cheltenham, Wales and beyond; however, recently, a number of the group have returned to living and working in Southampton and the surrounding area. Although, some of our members are currently sailing around the world: three on their own boat and one with the Royal Navy!

Since leaving Southampton University over the past few years, the group have remained close friends and it is conservation volunteer work which often brings them together. In the past few years the group has volunteered on the Isle of Mull in Scotland, on the Fens near Cambridge, at Frensham Ponds near Farnham and on Brownsea Island in Poole Harbour.

On this visit to Fleet Pond, the group set about clearing Fugelmere Island. Working on an island is a little different from many of the work parties and involves a degree of planning (and rowing) in order to ferry all of the volunteers and their tools, equipment and food (including the all important baked potatoes) across to the island.

Once on Fugelmere, the group set to work removing small trees from this reed-bed island, which have grown over the past few years. Many of the Mudlarks have been to Fleet Pond more than once and a number of people can remember clearing Fugelmere only a few years ago, and are surprised by the speed at which the trees are able to re-establish themselves on the island.

On the Saturday, the Mudlarks cleared about two-thirds of the island’s trees and the volunteers were able to savour (somewhat burned) baked potatoes, cooked on the fire. In characteristic style, a number of people managed to end up rather muddy, with Rosie getting more muddy than most!

On the Sunday, the group were joined by two first-time local Fleet Pond Society volunteers, Jess and Charlie, and set about clearing the remaining trees on the islands. In addition, the two rowing boats were used to clear the trees which were out of reach from dry land. Although the boats were a little tippy at times, everyone stayed dry, despite the volume of wet trees that were removed from the mud!

The Mudlarks had a great time and look forward to visiting Fleet Pond again next year.

Do You Know Your Trees?

OPAL (the Open Air Laboratories network) has produced a simple and clear booklet on 9 common trees and means for their identification. It’s worth a look if you’ve forgotten the basics! It can be downloaded here.

Volunteer Event 8th November – Tree Cutting

In spite of the inclement weather of the preceding days, Sunday was fortunately quite reasonable for volunteering. There was a very good turnout for the time of year with over 15 present.

The task was to cut down the small trees and and scrub in Gelvert Marsh. It was fairly boggy but nothing that a pair of Wellington’s couldn’t handle.

As you can imagine, lots of sawing was required, both for cutting the trees down in the first place (top photo) as well as removing the major branches.

Some of the cut trees were put together to provide a habitat for small animals and insects (as seen in the front of the photo immediately below) and the rest were burnt (bottom photo). All in all, a good morning’s work!

Bat Boxes For The Pond

Eight bat boxes were put up recently in the wood just west of the Green.

We are hoping to provide roosts for brown long-eared bats, pipistrelles and who knows what else?

FPS Photo Competition 2009: Tips For Sunrises And Sunsets

This year’s FPS Photography Competition (deadline 31 December 2009) has three categories:

1. Work or Play
2. Sunrise or Sunset
3. Birds

Here are some tips for taking stunning pictures of sunrises and sunsets (full details and a few more tips can be found here):

• Think Ahead – scope out good places and find out when the sun will set or rise
• Shoot At A Variety Of Focal Lengths – do you want a sweeping landscape shot or something zoomed in?
• Silhouettes As Focal Points – think of an attractive point of interest incorporating silhouettes
• Rule Of Thirds – it’s often good to place key elements off-centre
• Shoot At A Variety Of Exposures – abandon auto-mode and take some shots in aperture or shutter priority mode at different exposures
• Keep Shooting – until you’re sure it’s all over!

I hope you find these tips helpful and we’re looking forward to your creative submissions!

Picture credit: Vicki Jull

Volunteer Event 11th October – More Muddy Marshes!

Baby Toad Found In The Leaf Litter

Colin Gray writes:

Fleet Pond volunteers returned to Fugelmere Marsh for the October task to extend the clearance of alder and sallow scrub.  This large open marsh has become a small forest of regenerating scrub; some almost young trees now. It was a damp day so the volunteers were open to muddy water below and drizzling rain from above ensuring we were all very wet at the end of the day.  Never the less a lot was achieved and the volunteers have opened a wide vista across the marsh to the reedbed beyond.

David Buckler, leader for the day, has a herbicide license and was able to treat a lot of the scrub stumps which will hopefully constrain further regeneration.  Herbicide has usually been around 60% successful thus reducing manual labour in following seasons.

Photo credit: Michelle Salter (taken at the related volunteer event on Sunday 13 September).

Ranger’s Notebook – What To Look For In Autumn

Joanna Lawrence, the Fleet Pond Ranger, writes:

As winter draws in there seems to still be plenty of wildlife to see around Fleet Pond.  Many birds will be feeding themselves up for the winter by feasting on berries and seeds, and bats can still be seen flying around at dusk.  Bats are very busy at this time of year as the males continue looking for females to mate with, while at the same time searching for suitable winter hibernation sites and building up their fat reserves for the winter by feeding on insects.  One adult bat can eat about 3,000 insects in one night.

Southern Hawker Dragonfly

If you see any large dragonflies still flying this late in the year, they are Hawkers, the largest type of dragonfly in Britain which can be found flying until late October.  Any seen at Fleet Pond are most likely to be Southern Hawkers, a very beautiful blue, green and black dragonfly, or maybe Brown Hawkers, which have distinctive brown wings.  Common Darters, a smaller red dragonfly, may also be seen until early November.

Web Of The European Garden Spider

This photo of a spider’s web in the early morning dew was taken on Wood Lane Heath.  The spider that makes these webs is the European Garden Spider, Araneus diadematus. You have probably seen many of these spiders in your garden at this time of year hanging upside-down in the centre of its web.  These are known as the orb web spiders as they create this orb web in order to catch prey.  Not all spiders however make this type of web.  Some families of spider hunt visually and stalk their prey, and then there are numerous different types of spun webs with many families spinning their own variation.

Fly Agaric Fungus

Autumn is also a time of the year when the majority of our fungi are fruiting, like the poisonous species Fly Agaric.  This species is easily recognisable due to its bright red colour and can be seen in many places around Fleet Pond.  The one in the photo above was taken at Sandy Bay.

The part of the fungi that you can see is the fruiting body containing the spores, similar to the fruits and seeds produced by plants. The rest of the fungi is hidden underground as thin white threads known as Mycelium.

By breaking down dead organic material, fungi continue the cycle of nutrients through ecosystems. The majority of plants and trees on earth could not grow without the mycelium that inhabit their roots and supply them with essential nutrients. Look out for the multitude of fungi in bloom at this time of year.

(Please note that it is illegal to pick or remove fungi from Fleet Pond Local Nature Reserve.)