January Blue Skies
Well, it's been a busy start to 2022 for the Coast Care Volunteer team we have been out and about up and down the county from the North to the South with volunteer activities and we have enjoyed the sunny Beautiful Blue-sky days that January 2022 has started with.
Our new years resolution is to tackle more Marine and Beach litter in 2022 and this has started well with Beach Cleans from Druridge Bay in the south to Howick and Seahouses in the middle of the NCAONB and up to Cocklawburn in the North near Scremerston. The Storms before Christmas and really high tides have brought in a lot of marine debris with lots of fishing industry waste predominantly Lobster pots and fishing line washed up on the beaches but we are also finding lots of sewage related litter which is not great for us or our marine environment. A Big thanks to the Volunteer leaders who have helped with organising such important tasks to keep our beautiful coastline safe and healthy.
We have had a number of Coppicing sessions helping out at a piece of predominately Alder and Willow Carr woodland at Druridge bay Links, a site managed by The National Trust which is great for a variety of migrating birds on their journeys up and down the coast and we have made a real difference bringing back into rotation some old coppiced stools. Hopefully in the summer we will get to make a re-visit and see the fruits of our labour.
We have also had a session at Howick village wildlife area to help deal with Storm Arwen's damage, where the landscape features in the village hall grounds of two mature Scot's pine blew over in the storm and ended up in the nature pond. We set to work clearing up the debris and have made habitat pile dead hedges with the waste arisings and will follow up with some pond vegetation management to keep a mix of open and covered reed beds to the pond before the amphibians move in next month.
Our Work on the SSSI Sand dunes at Beadnell continued and we managed to remove some more of the over dominating Seabuckthorn, and it is great to see the marram grass and other primarily successional plant species re-colonising the dunes.