Hi folks, its nearly the end of month two of the traineeship and I can hardly believe how time flies!
I have been really busy since my last blog post.
A couple of days after, I had my first experience of community engagement whilst shadowing the Neil the woodlands officer. We were delivering 16 apple trees awarded through a community fund to a local allotments group to replace four large poplars. Due to a lack of communication between group members, we were met by some rather confused individuals. At first they were suspicious of the FREE trees we had for them, and were reluctant to accept the package. However, once they saw the trees in the flesh and were shown how easy it was to plant them, they were more than happy to take them off our hands.
Allotments Group and Neil
I have also attended several community meetings, usually shadowing a member of the communities team just to get a feel for how community groups work.
One of the great things about being on the ranger team is that we hold some of our team meetings outside, often going to a specific site and carrying out maintenance work for the whole day. Our last outdoor meeting saw us out at Balquidderock Wood, a local SSSI, carrying out a litter pick. Our next outdoor meeting will see the team going out to Drymen to finish off some drain clearance work, which we started on one of our volunteer action days.
Talking of volunteer action days, I have attended twoin the last month. The first was at Wester Moss, a lowland raised bog and SSSI, run by the ranger service, in conjunction with Butterfly Conservation Scotland. The day saw 27 volunteers come out to help us block existing drainage ditches on the bog with plastic sheet piling. We also pulled up pine saplings, which have been encroaching onto the bog, and conducted a litter pick and general clear-up just off the bog, and look what we got!
Wester Moss Action Day
I also ended up waist-deep in the bog in one swift wrong step. I was glad to be pulled out by a couple of volunteers. Unfortunately I didn’t get a comedy photo.
Our last community action day took place last week at Gallowhill Wood, Drymen. We had a grand total of 8 volunteers on the day, clearing existing drainage ditches, litter picking and cutting back vegetation from the paths. The day was a great success and we were able to see the fruits of our labour by the end when we got the ditches running again.
Gallowhill Wood Drains
Half an hour to get this bad boy out!
I have also attended two training courses, John Muir Leadership and Community Engagement. Both courses were really useful and were great opportunities to catch up with the rest of the Natural Communities Trainees.
I also attended a conference and ranger AGM run by the Scottish Countryside Rangers Association at SNH Battleby. The event was a great networking opportunity and I met a number of interesting individuals from a variety of ranger services throughout Scotland. The lunch was also superb!
I was able to put my John Muir Award leader skills into practice last week when I helped one of the rangers to build a hibernaculum with around 21 Primary 5s from Borestone Primary School as part of the Conserve element of their John Muir Award.
The kids were really enthusiastic and worked well as a team to gather the materials and build a great hibernaculum.
Finished Hibernaculum
So that’s just a slice of what I have been getting up to. I have a few community events planned for the next few weeks so fingers crossed they are a success too!
Thanks for reading!