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News - July 2006 Jenny Spelling's post as temporary warden at Parndon Wood has been extended till 1st October. Matt Waller, Wildspace! Officer, is leaving at the end of his contract on 1st August, but Wildspace events and activities will continue to be organized by Jenny for now. It looks like landscape maintenance in Harlow will be transferred to a joint venture company starting January 2007, but the nature reserve and wildspace service could stay within the Council coming under leisure services. The extension to Harlow Marshes will now not include all the meadows next to the river: the area directly between the station and the Moorhen is being earmarked for the "green bridge" linking Spurriers with the Moorhen, despite it looking like Harlow North will not be going ahead, at least for now. News - June 2006 Colin Lincoln who had been working as the part time warden of Parndon Wood since 2002, has now retired. On his last working day, which coincided with the first HCV task in the new year, as well as a barbeque, the new hide near the conservation centre was named the Lincoln Hide and HCV presented Colin with a carved plaque. Colin is now a very active volunteer with HCV. Jenny Spelling, who has volunteered with HCV, started as the new warden in March. The part-time post is temporary until 1st August, pending a review of nature reserve staffing with the end of the external Wildspace! funding, and possible transfer of landscape maintenance to a joint venture company. Following a review, HCV's policy on allowing children to take part in the group's activities has been brought into line with current best practice for an essentially adult group, i.e. similar to BTCV's Green Gym. The new policy is that if you are between 16 and 18 years old your parent or guardian must sign a consent form, while children under 16 must be accompanied by an adult who is responsible for them at all times. The Acorn Group run by the Wildspace! project caters for 12-17 year olds. HCV's 3-fold publicity leaflet has been updated with more recent pictures and revised contact information including email and website addresses. We are experimenting with printing on green paper instead of the previous yellow. You can download a copy from the resources page. New HCV newsletter editor and treasurer Following the HCV AGM in November, Jenny Spelling has taken over editing the newsletter from Andrew Urquhart. Andrew Tomlins replaces Marta Urquhart as treasurer. Many thanks to Andrew and Marta for doing these tasks for a good number of years. Other responsibilities remain the same. Parndon Wood Charcoal For Sale After quite a number of successful charcoal burns we now have a good stock of charcoal available for sale. The lumpwood charcoal works much better in a barbeque than briquettes and unlike much charcoal sold is locally produced from a sustainably managed source. It is for sale at a very reasonable £3 a medium sized bag. We also have a good quantity of "fines" - small pieces of charcoal that passed through the sieve when filling the main bags - which is excellent for producing a very high temperature, e.g. in a blacksmith's forge. It is probably better than coke which is usually used for this purpose because of fewer impurities. Contact Parndon Wood - phone 01279-430005. See also the HCV charcoal making guide. A new LNR is proposed for the Todd Brook valley centered on Netteswell Plantation. Discussions are ongoing concerning precise boundaries but the principle is in line with council planning department thinking. It was originally hoped to formally declare and launch the LNR this July, but this will probably be somewhat delayed now. HCV has a task there on 25th June. It is intended to extend the area of the Harlow Marshes LNR (Parndon Moat Marsh, Marshgate Spring, and Maymeads Marsh) to include all the flood-plain meadows and ditches, known as the Town Park ditches, between the river and the railway right up to the new gate by the mound at the car park behind the station. This has been made possible because certain planning issues in connection with road access to Harlow North have now been resolved. The former Road Safety Training Centre next to Marshgate Spring has been leased to Essex Police, so access beside the ditch from the HCV bridge to Marshgate Spring can now be reinstated, hence the task on 9th July. Back to Top. News - October 2005 HCV celebrates 20 years and 500 Tasks HCV celebrated its 20th Anniversary on Sunday 25th September with a task at Parndon Wood including a lunch courtesy of Harlow Council. The task also happened to be the 500th task (give or take one or two depending on what counts as a task). The work was to protect last season's coppiced trees from browsing by deer still in the wood - see Wigwams out, Baskets in! below. Councillor Eleanor Macy, chair of the environment and community committee, attended to thank the group. The task was followed in the evening by a pub meal. New Wildspace! Officer appointed The new Wildspace! Community Liaison Officer is Matt Waller. Matt was previously BTCV Green Gym officer in Basildon. He will continue and build on the work started by Helen Abel. This includes developing Harlow's local nature reserves and wildlife sites, involving the local community and volunteers of all kinds. One piece of work will be preparatory work for the proposed creation of a new LNR in the Todd Brook valley centered on Netteswell Plantation. It remains to be seen what if anything will follow the Wildspace! project when the external funding runs out in August 2006. For further information on Wildspace! events and conservation activities see the Wildspace! page. Charcoal success - Bags For Sale After several fairly unsuccessful attempts to make charcoal at the Parndon Wood May countryside and craft weekend in recent years, this summer we did two extra burns and got a result at last. We have obviously now got the method right, producing around 15 bags on each occasion; previously we had only got 3 or 4. The trick is knowing how to get the kiln hot enough - the kiln at Parndon Wood is quite small and its behaviour significantly different to that of the more common larger kilns (twice the diameter and often twice the height) for which instructions and advice are usually given. For the details of the method and the scientific backgound please see the HCV charcoal making guide. The lumpwood charcoal (needless to say, locally produced and from a sustainably managed source) is for sale at £3 a bag from Parndon Wood - phone 01279-430005. Deer browsing of coppice is an age-old problem, but deer numbers in this part of Essex have increased dramatically in recent years. Long-time HCV volunteers will be familiar with the electric fences which have been used at Parndon Wood to protect newly coppiced areas from deer browsing. At East End Wood we have been asked to build "wigwams" of cut twigs and branches over each coppice stool - the theory being if it is thick enough and sturdy enough the deer won't be able to get to the fresh leaves, while the tree will send new shoots through the brash and regrow as normal. More recently the fencing-in of the bottom two-thirds of Parndon Wood was supposed to have solved the problem once and for all. Unfortunately the deer have never been entirely removed, and the deer outside have been very persistent at attacking weaknesses in the older parts of the fence, and it is thought several have got back in. Last winter when coppicing was resumed, in line with advice from English Nature "wigwams" were built over most of the stools. On an HCV task Gary Dobrin happened to experiment by building a mini dead hedge or "basket" round one of the stools. Six months on, the regrowth of most of the coppice stools has been disappointing. The notable exception was the stool protected by Gary's basket, and to a lesser extent one of the stools which had thick piles of brash left on all sides with very little placed over the top. So the cynics who always thought that wigwams were a waste of time were right after all. Consulting recent literature it looks like other people have had similar experiences. The most likely explanation is that the light level is significantly reduced, particularly by the top of the wigwam directly above the centre of the stool. This inhibits the regrowth, with such regrowth that does occur being outwards, i.e. towards the nibbling deer. The less sturdy wigmans may also represent the perfect hiding place for the small muntjac deer! Why not build a dead hedge all round the coppice plot instead of baskets round indvidual stools or small groups of stools? A large perimeter dead hedge would have to be as high as dear fencing to stop the deer leaping over, and, like fencing, the deer would only have to breech it at one point for it to be useless. A basket by contrast looks like a trap to a deer - it is nervous that if it jumped in it might not have enough room to jump out again. The plan now at Parndon Wood is to replace the wigwams with baskets round as many stools in last season's coppice plot as possible; and then with the coming season's plot to build baskets as each tree is coppiced, even if it means a smaller overall area is coppiced. Biodiversity Guidance for Planners and Developers in Essex A biodiversity checklist for planners and developers in Essex, Thurrock, and Southend has been produced by the Essex Biodiversity Project planning group. This is an easy-to-use document to help promote best practice and explain legal requirements. It should be useful to developments as small as a house extension. It is in the form of an interactive PDF document currently on CD but which should be available shortly from the Essex Biodiversity Project website. Copies of the CD are available for a nominal £1 from Essex Biodiversity Project Coordinator, Claire Cadman, on 01621-862981. News - June 2005 New Wildspace! officer to be appointed Since starting in February 2004 as Harlow Wildspace! officer, Helen Abel, has done a superb job in getting many projects off the ground and involving so many people in the conservation of the nature reserves and green areas around the town. However, she is now moving on to a new career and life on the other side of London - we wish her all the best. It is understood that the post is to be advertised and the new person is to be appointed on a one-year contract, hopefully starting in August, so taking the project to the end of the period of external funding. Harlow Council has decided that Parndon Mill Marsh, part of Harlow Marsh Local Nature Reserve, will henceforth be called Parndon Moat Marsh. This follows complaints from the owners of Parndon Mill about visitors to the nature reserve using their private car park. Visitors to the reserve should use the car park behind the station or the Moorhen car park, both off Burnt Mill lane. Steps are due to go in so people can use the canal towpath to cross the A414 and access the nature reserve. Back to Top. News - March 2005 HCV programme and event alerts by email To improve the method of alerting members by email about HCV events, we have set up the HCV Yahoo! Group. The process of joining is automated, email addresses are not broadcast to the group, and if you don't want to receive alerts any more you can easily unsubscribe. If you would like to receive email alerts when a new task programme is available or about other items of interest please sign up by pressing the button below. Alternatively send a (blank) email to harlowconsvols-subscribe@yahoogroups.co.uk. Wildspace! Conservation Task Group A new conservation volunteer group has been formed in Harlow.
The group meets on the 1st and 3rd Fridays of each month, 10am-1pm, at Parndon Wood
to carry out conservation work in Parndon Wood or elsewhere in Harlow.
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