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October 2018
News
Busy times in the Three Brooks nature reserve By Sara Messenger of the Three Brooks Nature Conservation Group
T
he weather has recently seemed determined to push our group’s rather limited resources to their limits – we’re either been rescuing creatures from dried out ponds in the heatwave, wading through deep water caused by blockages and heavy rain or dealing with fallen trees caused by high winds!
Three Brooks lake
We’ve had some help with SGC’s Robocut being back on site – you may have seen it clearing the area they call ‘the bun’. This is where the silt was left when our lake was last de-silted, which we think was in 2002, but no one seems sure. The plan is to see how much space there is in the hope that when the lake is again de-silted, the silt can be left here
instead of being taken off site. The first step to clearing the lake is testing for contamination and hydrocarbons. This has been done and has come back negative, now all SGC need to do is finish their ‘method statement’ and find a large pot of money! One of the fishermen told me of a lake that was effectively cleared for free as the cost was offset by the silt being sold to a fertilizer company, an idea I think should be looked into. We’ve also discovered our silt traps aren’t silt traps at all, just bends in the brook, which could go some way to explain the state of our lake. Thank you to everyone who has been petitioning SGC to get our once lovely lake restored to its former glory. Whatever you’ve been doing, it has worked. Several of you have spotted the egret at the lake and some think they may have seen a pair; please keep the reports and photos
coming in (sightings@threebrooks.info) and we’ll keep our fingers crossed that our newest visitors stay. On the 29th August we received reports from dog walker Andrea of contamination in the brook at Sherbourne’s Brake. We reported it to the Environment Agency and we’re hoping no lasting damage was done. It’s not the first time we’ve had this problem in our brooks, caused by what appears to be someone pouring paint or cleaning fluid down one of the road drains, although I’m sure if they were aware that these drains feed into the brooks, they wouldn’t have done it. If you should spot a problem, the Environmental Agency incident hotline number is 0800 807060. Further sad news is that we received the post-mortem report on our cygnet Angelo from Slimbridge vet Dan Calvo-
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Carrasco. Readers will recall that Angelo was found dead at Forty Acres in Stoke Gifford. His death was, as we feared, caused by: “A heavy impact, a force applied vertically to the back of the animal. He also had a rib fracture (likely caused by trauma as well)”. The police have been informed and the report added to the file. Our other three cygnets haven’t been seen since the day of Angelo’s death, although our exhausted cob Bradley was picked up the following day by the RSPCA who, without consulting us, put him down. Our thanks then and now go to PC Jamie Shiels for his investigations into what was an abhorrent and heartless crime.
The Tump & moth trapping Our September workday saw us begin the ‘battle of the bramble’ on the Tump. As the bramble has encroached on the edge of
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