In December, local volunteers and Staffordshire Wildlife Trust staff cleared the seating area adjacent to the River Churnet in the Sainsbury’s Nature Area. SWT warden Ros has suggested forming a Friends of Sainsbury’s Pools group – an initiative we are keen to support.
There have been very few iNaturalist surveys recorded around these pools. Members are encouraged to visit this diverse habitat and send in their findings. Nature in Your Neighbourhood will be running an iNaturalist training session if you are unsure how to use the App.
Penny and Jane took part in the annual BSBI New Year Plant Hunt and found 12 native flowering plants, considerably better than our scores in 2023 and 2024, when we found three each year!
In news from the NIYN project, Penny has just run a coppicing workshop at Ladderedge Country Park. This is a busy time of year for tree planting and there are opportunities to sign up for a session with the Dane Valley Climate Action Group or with the Manifold CAN group. As usual, the local SWT groups at Rod Wood and Swineholes Reserve always welcome new volunteers.
Finally, we were thrilled that the initiative to wake up the apple trees in two of the community orchards that we manage went off so well. The full details are covered in our Spotlight article.