July has been the busiest month so far for both of my trainee projects; habitat works and public engagement. On the ground work for my habitat project got underway and was completed by the end of July, and in between supervising that I managed to plan and deliver 6 wildlife gardening workshops for my public engagement project!
My habitat project was the creation of a large wetland at Loch Lomond in collaboration with RSPB Scotland. This is by far the biggest habitat project I have worked on at Froglife, making it a really exciting one to choose for my personal project. Although I would have had more responsibility on a smaller habitat project, I am really happy I chose this one. Although there was a lot of work and planning involved, it has been really valuable to gain experience collaborating with other conservation organisations, and really exciting to be involved in such a fantastic project!
The Loch Lomond project turned a large, rush-encroached field into a wonderful wetland habitat designed to support amphibians, birds and other wildlife. We created four large ponds interconnected by a ditch line, and installed pipe sluices enabling us to manage water levels in years to come. I can’t wait for the ponds to fill with rainwater and see what wildlife starts to appear! Due to the size of the ponds, they also make good habitat for some of our amphibian species that require large ponds, such as common toads and great crested newts. We will go back with volunteers in the autumn to create additional wildlife-friendly features at the site, such as hibernacula, to further enhance the area for wildlife. We will also monitor the site after 1, 3, 5 and 10 years to assess how it is doing and undertake any necessary habitat maintenance or improvements.
My public engagement project, the wildlife gardening workshops, have also been very busy this month. I have been delivering these for seven months now, and although many of these were online to start, I’m now really getting into the swing of the in-person ones. This month has been the busiest yet as I have planned and delivered 6 workshops, including 3 therapeutic workshops. The therapeutic workshops are for groups with learning and / or physical difficulties, and we run four workshops with these groups rather than one. This gives us more time to teach the groups about amphibians, reptiles and wildlife gardening, and often allows us to work on multiple wildlife features with the group. The therapeutic workshops this month were with an Alzheimer Scotland gardening group in Falkirk. The workshops have been a lot of fun and so far the group have made a fantastic tub pond for amphibians in their garden as well as creating hanging macramé bird feeders. We will have our final session at the beginning of August to create ‘toad abodes’! I particularly enjoy the therapeutic workshops as the four sessions mean I get to know the group better and spend more time with them, and it also means we can do a few different activities to make sure everyone gets to do something they enjoy.
