Bearded tit at the Country Park, it's possible! (picture Don Morris)

It may be frozen and gloomy but you can’t cower inside until until May; can you?

What might lift the spirits and get the blood pumping is to come to the Country Park for a walk. We have a fantastic network of paths including 5 miles of surfaced trails for cycling if you’re feeling really active. From a long hike to the shortest stroll the Millennium Country Park offers wonderful views and a variety of meadows, woods and water. At the end of a walk the Lakeside Cafe is the place for a cake, hot soup and coffee.

If you’d like to join others, why not come to one of our guided walks? This weekend there are two.

Feathers in the freezer – a bird walk

The Bird walk   will happen on Saturday 4 February 2012, 8am – 11am and costs £3/adult, £2/child. £1 reduction for Volunteers and Friends.  Life’s tough at this time of year and there’s always a chance of rarities in the Country Park. Our volunteer leaders are the people to tell you what you are looking at or listening to.

No experience of birdwatching is necessary because leaders know everything necessary to introduce you to the wonderful world of birding.  Bring binoculars if you have them although these are not essential as there are usually some spares and often the chance to look down telescopes.

Wrap up warm- birders often spend ages rooted to the spot waiting for something to happen! There are some rough paths and short lengths of gradient over 1:6. Please book in advance but pay the leader on the day. Call 01234 767037 to book a place.

Sunday Stroll, a Gentle Sunday Walk 

5 February at 10.30am
Come and join us in the Country Park for a gentle walk to hear how the Park was set up and a little about the surrounding area.

The walk will keep to hard surfaced tracks in the Park which are mostly level but have short sections of gradient up to 1:9.

Call 01234 767037 for more details.
Cost £1, payable on the day – no need to book. Meet at reception. Walks last approximately 2 hours.                              

Why not finish the morning off with lunch in our Forest Centre Restaurant? Call 01234 767037 for details.

Hornet clearwing moth (image Devegg Rudd)

During February there will be some noticeable tree felling in the Millennium Country Park. Anyone who has visited the Park will know that most of the woodland on site is still very young and made up of a diverse mix of British native tree and shrub species. However, there is a significant number of mature trees on site; mostly poplar.

Poplars are fast-growing and naturally short-lived and ours are approaching the end of their lives. The aging process is being hastened by the larvae of the hornet clearwing moth (Sesia apiformis) which create extensive tunnels, generally at the base of trees. The larvae feed on live wood and exposed roots; a process that severely damages trees and leaves them susceptible to being blown over in high winds. Damage caused by the larvae is obvious in severely infested trees that have fallen; the base is reduced to something resembling honeycomb.

Last winter all our mature trees were surveyed by an arboriculturalist for health and condition. This survey will guide the management of these trees in the coming years. It identified a number of trees in particularly poor condition. This, coupled with the fact that many of the trees are in close proximity to well used paths and the railway, means they must be felled for public safety reasons. Some will be pollarded (cut at two metres or more above ground level) where it is safe to do so, to retain standing dead wood. A good proportion of the felled trees will be left to rot down naturally. Dead wood is a hugely important but often overlooked habitat which supports a wide variety of invertebrates as well as the small mammals and birds which feed on them.

This work is scheduled for February to ensure it is completed before the bird nesting season begins and it is likely that a proportion of the poplars on site will be felled each winter in the knowledge that their condition will only deteriorate further in future.

Areas currently dominated by poplar will be restocked in the coming years with the same mix of native species which has been planted in the rest of the Park.

There may be some minor disruption to some of the paths while the work is carried out but short diversions will be marked to ensure this is kept to a minimum.

For further information please contact Anna Charles- Head Ranger at anna.charles@marstonvale.org or 01234 762614

Not long 'til May (image Tim Blake)

It’s well known that the best pictures are available on the radio. When driving between meetings this morning I caught one of BBC Radio 4’s ‘Nature’ series which described Emma Turner, a pioneering wildlife photographer and some of her life and work on Hickling Broad in Norfolk in the early years of the Twentieth Century.

Apart from being an interesting and inspiring story which you should listen to if you have an interest in wetlands and their wildlife, or indeed, in people achieving great things against what must have been the usual run of things; it also was a wonderful programme to hear on an extremely gloomy January morning. Sounds of a May morning – bitterns, reed warblers, sedge warblers, grasshopper warblers. I closed my eyes and I was there.

This might be a good moment to remind you that we will shortly be taking bookings for the Dawn Chorus Walk and Breakfast 2012, which will almost certainly happen at 4.30am on Saturday 5 May, in the Millennium Country Park. Detail will follow shortly.

In the mean time, listen again to Radio 4, close your eyes and imagine…

Forest Volunteers take a break from the bashing (image Don Morris)

I’ve done a lot of scrub bashing in my life (really a lot) and it’s usually quite fun as long as the duration of each episode is limited. One can have too much of a good thing and clearing dangerously prickly hawthorn bushes for days on end in bitter cold and often wet conditions is far from my idea of a good time. Last Sunday’s bash was however, the best ever.

For one thing the weather was fantastic; about as beautiful a January day as I’ve ever experienced. Sharply cold and as clear as a well crafted blog post. Somewhere in the region of twenty five Forest Volunteers showed up at the Forest Centre to spend the morning clearing hawthorn from part of the Callow Mounds. And there was the second good thing – a morning scrub bashing. About long enough to work up an appetite and feel like you’ve earned a sit down, but not so much that your hawthorn hatred gets out of control. Followed by a lazy Sunday afternoon doing not ever so much.

This was our more or less annual Volunteer task and lunch at which the Marston Vale Trust is pleased to offer a small token to say a sincere thank you to the legion of people who help us out doing all sorts of things through the year. The token was lunch and everyone enjoyed it thoroughly.

I had a previous lunch appointment so missed the food, so I will use this opportunity to say thank you to all the Forest Volunteers who make the Forest happen. Without you all we would be unable to make such huge progress each year.

And another thing that made it for me was Anna’s scallops (or were these scollops?) Usually on these occasions one is presented with an area of bushes and asked to cut down bushes. Here we were asked to create scallops, gorgeous curves breaking into the depths of the tangled thorn which can only become beautiful refugia for our butterflies come the spring. Thinking while scrub bashing was a revelation – brilliant!

Guy Lambourne

The video was taken on 4 January 2012. The first of the two divers appeared on the lake on 9 December 2011, a second was seen briefly on 24 December, and two have been present continuously since 3 January 2012.

Great northern divers are now the most regularly seen of the divers in Bedfordshire with a few being present in the county during most of the recent winter periods. These birds breed in Canada, the northern part of the US, Alaska, Greenland, Iceland and very occasionally in Scotland. In the British Isles great northern divers are mainly winter visitors and most are found on the coast, with a probably increasing number wintering inland on large lakes.

Martin Green (Volunteer)

Although they aren’t seen frequently on inland freshwater lakes at this time of year, it’s not unheard of. Indeed, I see there are records posted today at www.birdguides.com at Grafham, Cambridgeshire and Rollesby Broad, Norfolk.

Martin promised to get his video on Vimeo. When he does, I’ll get a link up here.

Plant a tree - everyone can do it (image John O'Reilly)

We are very pleased to be able to invite you to plant a tree at Octagon Wood, near Willington. After a hugely successful planting day at Top Farm near Lidlington in early December, we will move north to the edge of Bedford in February and we hope you will be able to join us. 

Owned by Bedford Borough Council, the first part of Octagon Wood was planted a year ago and it will be great to get back to finish things off. As the Wood lies astride Route 51 of the National Cycle Network, at the heart of Bedford River Valley Park, the new planting, which once again will be run in partnership with Bedford Borough Council, will add an extra experience to the ride from Milton Keynes to Sandy or for the less ambitious, it’s very easily accessible by bicycle from Priory Country Park click for map If you can ride from Priory on 12 February, why not give it a try? 

Naming the wood

Last February, we ran a competition to name the wood and the two winners who both suggested the name Octagon Wood will, we hope, be able to come back and join Mayor of Bedford, Dave Hodgson, to officially name it. The ceremony will take place at midday – don’t miss it.

Can’t ride or walk? Catch a free bus

Please don’t drive to the site – there’s no parking. A free bus service will run to the planting site from:

• the Forest Centre at Marston Moretaine (departing every half hour between 10.30 and 14.00) ,
• Elstow Park & Ride (every half hour between 10.45 and 14.15). Click for location map

The last bus will leave the planting site at 15.15

Why not sign up to receive email updates by typing your address into the box to the right of this screen.

Watch out for Cupid’s arrows

Timed to co-incide with St Valentine’s Day, our February planting event is an ideal opportunity to show your environmental class to the love of your life. Why not adopt a tree for that significant other in your life? Or perhaps, if you are both feeling hardy and are prepared to wrap up warm, you might come to the event together. It might be cold and wet, but it could be beautifully romantic and a real day to remember. Read more about adopting trees in the Forest.

All comforts on site (possibly)

We can’t promise it will be warm, sunny and dry, in fact it will probably be cold, grey and wet, so please wear something warm. We can promise, however, that there will be free tea, coffee and biscuits for all and there will be bacon rolls and soup on sale to warm you up a little. We always have  a loo on site too.

Ride with a guide

We are very keen to encourage people to come to the planting day under their own steam, so there’s going to be a ‘ride-in’ from Priory Country Park Visitor Centre.

Why not bring your bicycle to Priory and join our guide at 10.45am who will lead you at a steady pace along the surfaced, flat and well signed National Cycle Network Route 51; a distance of  just over 1 mile. Riding in a group’s fun and you won’t get lost!

Of course it’s a lovely walk too!

For more information about the day call 01234 762608 or email 

Kingfisher in winter (image-Don Morris)

Tuesday 27 December, 8am – 11am.

Shake off the Christmas excess and find out how birds fare at this time of year on a guided walk in the Country Park.

Winter can be a rough time for birds. When the ground’s frozen, worms are difficult to get at and should lakes and ponds freeze, the likes of kingfishers can suffer. However, many species are here to enjoy our relatively mild climate, having flown south to escape the Arctic winter.

Many species arrive in the UK to overwinter and feed in our hedgerows, fields, lakes and wetlands. We should see a good range of these during this walk, given some luck. If anyone can find them, our volunteer bird walk leaders can.

Talk to the experts

You’ll be in good company, with people who really know what they are talking about. But don’t be put off by their great expertise – there’s no point-scoring here (well maybe a little between the experts). However much or little you know about birds, you’ll be made very welcome. If you have binoculars, bring them along but that’s not essential as there are usually some spare pairs and often a chance to look through a telescope. But beware – catching a good view of a beautiful bird through a high quality telescope is a glorious experience and might just be the beginning of a life-time passion.

Binoculars or not – make sure you wrap up warm. This isn’t a hike that will get the blood pumping. These guys are prepared to stand still for long periods to get the view they want. There are some rough paths and short lengths of gradient over 1:6.

£3/adult, £2/child. £1 reduction for Volunteers and Friends

Please book in advance but pay the leader on the day. Call 01234 767037

Hard graft on the boardwalk (image Don Morris)

Last Thursday myself and five hardy souls braved the first icy chill of winter to install some mesh on the boardwalk at the Millennium Country Park. The method behind our madness was that the mesh would provide members of the public with a solid footing on a surface which can resemble an ice rink when it is wet and muddy. We tensioned the mesh over the boardwalk then secured it in place with a combination of different types of staples. Trying to hold the staples in place with a set of frozen digits before trying to hammer them in (and missing one’s fingers) was a great challenge in the cold conditions.

At one point it looked like morale was flagging among the volunteers and I was worried they would scarper when my back was turned. Thankfully they all cheered up and warmed up when I brought out steaming hot cups of tea and coffee and some hot mince pies. We returned to the challenge of completing the job before the dark descended and finished the task just before 4pm. It was a superb effort from the volunteers to finish what was a challenging job in the cold conditions Thankfully it is not one which we  turn our hand to everyday but when finished, makes a big difference to the safety of visitors to the park.

The next chance to do some practical work in the Country Park is on Saturday 21 January at 10.15am, when we will be doing some willow coppicing.

As ever, wear old clothes and bring lunch if you can stay all day. We provide tea and biscuits (the mince pies were a festive special!) Meet at the Forest Centre.

Please contact me to let me know if you would like to attend –  email or call 01234 762610

Steve Gascoyne, Park Ranger

I also took a couple of minutes of video of the day. Oh for a decent cameraman, but I have to make do with me so this is as good as it’s likely to get.