Lincolnshire Wildlife Trust BOURNE AREA GROUP NEWSLETTER1
June 2025
Image credit – LV Fleming
In this issue:
What’s in a name / Chinese mitten crabs / Open days / Wellhead hedge laying / SKDC biodiversity consultation / A new name for the group? / Events programme
1 DISCLAIMER. This newsletter is produced by the Bourne Area Group of the Lincolnshire Wildlife Trust – it does not necessarily reflect the views of the Trust itself.
WHAT’S IN A NAME?
On my way to Deeping Lakes via Frognall, my eye is often taken by one of the road signs: Cranmore Drove (cover photo). Why? Well, it’s one of the 300 or more place names that record the historic presence of cranes in our landscape. Place names (toponyms) can tell us a lot about the history of our countryside and the wildlife that occupied it. Often such toponyms might include a species’ name suffixed with a feature of the landscape, such as Beverley (a clearing in the woods with beavers)
‘Cranmore’ means the ‘crane-moor’ (or possibly the ‘crane-mere’), the reference to a ‘moor’ or ‘mere’ in this case being to the former fenland. The name moor in Old English or Old Norse referred also to marshes and not just the upland habitat we typically refer to as ‘moors’ today.
There are lots of other crane place names in the UK, including places such as Cranbrook, Cranfield, Cranleigh, Tranmere and Tranwell, showing the species was once genuinely widespread and familiar. Strangely, there are few such place names in the Fens (do people know of many others other than the one above?), despite these areas being ideal former habitat for cranes. A similar absence from the Fens is noted for sea eagle place names, another species likely to have found the former Fens to their liking (see here2). Why is this? The current fenland landscape is essentially a new rectilinear landscape (with new place names too) that entirely replaced the older, more complex wetland landscape. Just as we have lost the carrs, creeks, islands, meres and reedbeds of the old fens, I think we probably have lost the many names that went with them. A loss not only of the original ecosystems and their wildlife but of our linguistic and cultural links to them too.
Cranmore Drove is only just over 10km from Willow Tree Fen as the crane flies. Cranes just need sufficient habitat to return to the places once named after them. At the time of writing, the pair of cranes with chicks (two originally) at Willow Tree Fen are still actively looking after their surviving chick, the other is assumed to have been predated.
For those who are interested in toponyms linked to wildlife, a book has recently been published – The Cuckoo’s Lea by Michael Warren - about bird place names. I haven’t read it yet but it’s on my list. And if you’re interested, buy it from and support your local bookshop (not the other place!).
CHINESE MITTEN CRABS ERIOCHEIR SINENSIS
Invasive non-native species are a major cause of global biodiversity loss, especially on islands. Whilst we are familiar with many non-native species and can see some on an almost daily basis (e.g. muntjac deer & grey squirrels), not all are obvious.
This is especially the case for aquatic species whose lives underwater render them un-noticed by most of us. And we have another non-native species that is
2 https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/00063657.2012.683388#d1e2157
now starting to appear in our rivers, drain and dykes - the Chinese mitten crab (see more details on the GB Non-native Species Secretariat site here3).
This species was probably brought to Britain in the ballast water of ships and was established in the Thames by 1935. They have been spreading ever since and are established in nearby rivers such as the Ouse. Adults breed in estuaries in the autumn with eggs hatching in the spring, juveniles and adults then migrate back up rivers, travelling up to 1000km in their native China, and they can cross short distances of dry land (they do a return migration in the autumn to breed). In rivers, their burrowing can damage flood defences and can cause silting of gravel used for spawning by fish and they can out-compete the native (and threatened) white-clawed crayfish. They are in the IUCN (World Conservation Union) list of the world’s 100 worst invasive species. Another pressure on native wildlife that we don’t need.
Why mention them here? Well, they are now in the Counter Drain from Pode Hole onwards (and probably elsewhere too). To enable better monitoring we contributed some of the funds the Area Group has raised to John Oliver, warden at Willow tree Fen, to purchase materials to make some devices (see images) to better understand their movements in local waterways. Doing this might enable traps to be designed to prevent or disrupt their migrations (up or downstream) and to assess how effective such traps are. The work is in collaboration with the Natural History Museum and the Welland & Deepings Internal Drainage Board.
A Chinese mitten crab (Image credit: Christian Fischer. Reproduced under Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported licence).
3 https://www.nonnativespecies.org/non-native-species/information-portal/view/1379#
Arrays of tubes, into which the crabs like to seek refuge, being trialled to monitor Chinese mitten crabs. Image credit: LV Fleming
OPEN DAYS, FUND RAISING & THANK YOU!
Our two annual open days are one of the major ways we introduce the public to the Trust and our reserves. They are also our major fund-raising opportunity. Our two recent open days at Dole Wood (April) and Deeping Lakes (June) have been a big success with good weather for both.
At Dole Wood in glorious weather on April 27th when we raised close to £600 for the Trust with 155 adults and 17 children joining us. At the Deeping Lakes open day on June 1st, we raised £550 (after expenditure) with 175 adults and children coming participating. A combined total of around £1150.
We hope that our visitors had a good day enjoying the reserves, the refreshments and the activities for children and taking home plants for their gardens.
As always, the open days depend on a lot of people donating a lot of their time and putting in a lot of effort, from helping on the day and beforehand. We had a lot of gratefully received home-baked cakes and other refreshments and these are, as always, a major source of income on the day.
We should not forget the plant sales provided by Hazel Williams, not only do these contribute significantly to income on the day, but Hazel and James also hold separate plant sales for the Trust. A recent one at JNCC4 in Peterborough, for example, raised £218.
Morton Co-op also generously donated essential supplies, including tea, milk, coffee, sugar & napkins etc which helped to make both events a success. We are very grateful to them.
So, whether to people who helped on the day, who helped in other ways and to our visitors, a very big THANK YOU!
WELLHEAD HEDGE LAYING
In February, on behalf of Bourne United Charities (BUC), Dave Vandome and a team of volunteers laid a hedge at the Wellhead in the centre of Bourne with the aim of rejuvenating the hedge and providing a people-proof barrier. It has now greened up and is fulfilling its intended function. It also brought a traditional countryside skill into the centre of town and some good publicity for the Trust. We thank Steve and all those at BUC for their help. We look forward to continuing collaboration with BUC, Don’t Lose Hope community garden and the Bourne Girl Guides to build on this and previous events in demonstrating at the Wellhead what you can do for wildlife in your own garden.
4 https://jncc.gov.uk/
During and after – the newly-laid hedge at the Wellhead (Image credits: LV Fleming & N Eveleigh)
THE FENS IN 1945
I stumbled across this old film somewhere – The Pattern of Britain - Fenlands (1945) [Digitally Enhanced] - it is nice look at life and farming in the fens of the 1940s. if you can’t use the hyperlink, just Google the title – the film is on YouTube.
SKDC BIODIVERSITY CONSULTATION
South Kesteven District Council have recently launched a consultation on biodiversity. The consultation is available here5. The consultation closes on June 30th. Feel free to contribute if you want to have your say. If you’ve missed the deadline (we tried to get the newsletter online beforehand), then there will, hopefully, be some feedback from SKDC on the outcome. And there is more about their plans for boosting biodiversity and rewilding here6 .
A NEW NAME FOR THE GROUP?
Well, we began with names so we will end (almost) with names. We are called the Bourne Area Group but it has always been the case that our area also includes the Deepings and Stamford. Inevitably, because we always hold indoor meetings in Bourne, there does tend to be a bit of a Bourne focus. Is that a problem and should be give ourselves a different name (and focus) to reflect the geographic coverage of the Area Group? We’ll be discussing this in our coming committee meetings but in the meantime, any thoughts you have are welcome. And if we change the name, what do we change it to??
EVENTS
See programme annexed. Our next trip is to look for purple emperor butterflies at Morkery Wood on 19th July. Last year, one purple emperor spent several minutes on my (admittedly sweaty) boots on roughly the same date last year, so fingers crossed. I’ll wear the same boots!
5 https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/rewildsk25
6 https://www.southkesteven.gov.uk/rewilding
Annex
EVENTS PROGRAMME
More details on each talk will be provided closer to the time. All talks at the Bourne Methodist Hall at 7.30pm.
Outdoor meetings
19 July MORKERY WOOD – walk to look for purple emperor and other butterflies. Meet at 0930am in the FC car park – success might depend on the weather…
Indoor meetings
10 September [To be confirmed ]
8 October Cali Colour: hummingbirds, tanagers and more – James Williams
12 November How can farmers enhance their farms for nature? – Liz & Kate Genever.
11 February Cycle tour of Lincolnshire Nature Reserves - Libby John.
11 March Reeds, water and wildlife: a naturalist’s record in sound and images of the river Glen reserves - Terry Barnatt.