fbpx Skip to main content
Discovery Map Map icon
Discovery Map Map icon

On the Ground in February 2018



On the Ground in February 2018

March 8, 2018

Don’t forget to say hello if you spot our Rangers and volunteers out working in the National Park. Here’s a taste of what they achieved in February 2017.

  • Started building barn owl boxes ahead of the nesting season and trained on how to check barn owl boxes with an ecologist from the Hawk Conservency.
  • Stayed up late to support stargazing events as part of our South Downs Dark Night Skies Festival and got up early to attend our annual Farmers’ Breakfast events.
  • Gave feedback to the Clausentum Fen conservation group on improving site for water vole including advice on which species to plant and how best to monitor the population.
  • Worked with Natural England rangers at Old Winchester Hill to cut back encroaching scrub on the chalk grassland. The site is grazed by herdwick sheep but brushcutters and the VRS lend a helping hand!
  • With the Game and Wildlife Conservation Trust gave training on hedgerow management to farmers from the Winchester Downs Farm Cluster and the Selborne Landscape Partnership.
  • Began work on the Preshaw Estate as part of our partnership with the farmers of the Winchester Downs Cluster Group, work includes thinning trees around Lomer pond to allow in more light and open up the view from the South Downs Way.
  • Taught teachers and students at Easebourne school how to prune their orchard trees – they’ll be doing it themselves in future.
  • Created a deer hedge to protect coppice regrowth at Graffham Down, took Witley Scouts Hedgelaying at Stedham Campsite; layed hedge at Binsted and spent two weeks to lay 184m of hedge up a particularly steep slope at Saddlescombe Farm.
  • Cleared scrub on Millpond Bottom, Bepton Down SSI, Tower Hill SSSI, Kingley Vale NNR, Chanctonbury Ring SSSI; Beeding Hill SSSI; Anchor Bottom SSSI, The Long Man SSSI and follow up work at Beddingham Hill SSSI.
  • Carried out habitat restoration work on Batten Hanger at Hooksway for Duke of Burgundy butterfly.
  • Carried out coppicing at Church Copse, felled non-native trees at Bignor Hill SSSI and felled trees at Steyning Combe to support butterfly conservation and continued management of a traditional coppice rotation at a piece of ancient woodland near Marwell Zoo.
  • Worked with volunteers from the charity MIND to replace dormice survey boxes at Graffham Down and supported a Cache In Trash Out litter-picking event with geocachers on the site.
  • Replaced a bridleway gate on the South Downs Way near Ditchling Beacon.