Berwick Wildlife Group

Once occupied by railway tracks and yards, the Goody Patchy is now an area of mixed woodland and grassland between Dock Road and the railway embankment. It forms part of an important wildlife corridor up the Tweed Estuary, and also contains part of the Pilgrims’ Way from St. Boisil’s and St Bartholemew's church to Holy Island.

On 14th June, Maurice McNeeley, accompanied by local residents, showed the site to a party from BWG and explained the maintenance carried out here by the St. Boisil’s and St. Bartholomews Residents’ Association. The Northumberland Wildlife Trust carry out some further woodland management. Much has happened since the Group’s first visit in 2006.

Careful thinning of the trees is encouraging understorey and woodland plants, such as ferns. War has been declared on a few small patches of Japanese knotweed on the margin. Plentiful nest boxes have been installed and are regularly used by blue-tits, and there are also bat boxes. Although the warblers mainly pass through on migration, a pair of blackcaps are now nesting here.

Thanks to a careful cutting regime, part of the grassland area is a very spectacular plant-rich sward, with abundant Northern Marsh Orchids, clovers and plenty of insects. A single Common Spotted Orchid was found, together with a Northern Marsh/Common Spotted hybrid. The invasion of sea buckthorn and sycamore is being kept in check by mowing late in the season. Opportunity was taken to examine the flower-rich patch in more detail, and 29 plant species were recorded, including Oval Sedge which has not been found there before. The total plant species count is now 36 in the grassy patch and 70 elsewhere on the site, a total of 93 (there being some plants found both on the grassy patch and in the woodland).

Berwick Wildlife Group are most grateful to Maurice McNeely for showing them round the Goody Patch, the St Boisil's and St Bartholemew's Residents Association for all their hard work in protecting and improving the site, and the Council's grasscutting team who's careful cutting regime allows the plants in the grassland to flourish.

Elizabeth Martin Fisher, June 2009

It was a gloriously sunny afternoon on 19th April when Mark Wilkinson of Save our Squirrels and Elizabeth Bamford of the SoS Berwick Group led members of the Berwick Wildlife Group on a walk in Detchant Wood, looking for signs of squirrels.

Detchant, together with Kyloe and Shiellow Woods, is one of the last strongholds in England for our native red squirrel and is very important in its continued survival. Squirrels weren’t to be seen in mid-afternoon, but there were plenty of signs to show their presence. Both red and grey squirrels strip the scales from cones to feed on the seeds, leaving the cones with a characteristic appearance. When mice chew the cones the remnants are much neater, so “squirrelled” cones are a good indication of squirrel presence. When mice eat hazelnuts they gnaw a hole at one end, but squirrels use their teeth to cut the shell in half.

To distinguish between red and grey squirrels, feeders filled with nuts and provided with sticky pads on the underside of the lid catch hairs from the squirrels’ shoulders. Since grey squirrels do have red hairs (leading to the mistaken idea that the two species interbreed), the hairs need to be examined under a microscope. The reds’ hairs show a groove while those of the grey are round.

It is even possible to estimate squirrel numbers. Elizabeth had set out a model cone transect, a tenth of the size of a real one, as a demonstration. A strip under the trees 5m (as opposed to 50m for the real thing) by 1m was marked out and cleared of cones. After a few days the total number of cones in the given area is counted along with the number of squirreled cones. These figures are used to give a fairly accurate estimate of the squirrel population.

Elizabeth Bamford gave the group a brief history of the wood. It dates back to the 12th century and has been handed down through the same families. Around 1650 Charles I camped here on his way to Berwick. In the 1860’s the wood was hit by a severe storm and over 3000 trees were blown over, mostly oaks. At one time part of the wood was mined for coal and the remnants of bell pits can still be seen.

Although there were no squirrels visible, there were roe deer and a hare in the neighbouring fields, a common lizard was at the edge of the path and the air was full of birdsong. Violets, primroses, sweet woodruff, golden saxifrage, wood anemones, wood sorrel and dog’s mercury were in flower and peacock, comma, orange-tip and white butterflies were on the wing.

Molly Hardie. April 2009

On Saturday 21st March Berwick Wildlife Group took part in their first summer walk or 2009 – and a summer-like day it was with blue skies and calm conditions. Unfortunately, as our leader Janet Simkin told us, the dry weather of the last few weeks has shrivelled the mosses and lichens and made them much harder to identify. What's more, because these organisms need plenty of water, sand dunes are not the ideal place to find lots of different species. In many ways this was a good thing. Janet eventually discovered 25 moss species and 22 lichen species at Cocklawburn (she kindly provided a list), more than enough for beginners to get their heads round.

Janet began by explaining the differences between mosses, liverworts and lichens. Bryophytes (mosses and liverworts) are primitive plants, without internal "plumbing" or proper roots, which is why they are small and sensitive to drought. They reproduce by means of tiny spores which blow about in the wind. Moss leaves are arranged all around the stems, whereas leaves of leafy liverworts appear to be arranged in two ranks, or the whole plant is a flat leathery plate.

Lichens, on the other hand, are not plants at all, but are stable and identifiable combinations between algae and a fungi, an arrangement which benefits both (symbiosis). The algae are protected within the tough fungal outside layer, and the fungi gain nutrient from the algae which are green(ish) and use sunlight to manufacture food from simple chemicals.

Berwick Wildlife Group were then introduced to a number of mosses. There was plenty of Common Feather-moss (Eurhynchium praelongum), which forms loose masses of delicate feathery growth; Whitish Feather-moss (Brachytecium albicans), which has longer, much "stringier" stems; Big Shaggy-moss (Rhytidiadelphus triquetrus) which is upright and forms large clumps; and its smaller relative Lawn Moss (Rhytidiadelphus squarrosus) which is characteristic of shaded lawns and grasslands. Sandhill Screw-moss (Syntrichia ruralis ruraliformis) is an important plant stabilising dunes and forms big moisture-retaining mounds in the dry environment.

Lichens were abundant on the walls of the lime kiln. Lichens are extremely fussy about their substrate – each species is found only on rocks of the correct chemical composition, so the rock type gives a great clue to the species of lichen. (Or, you could say that the lichens, in a churchyard for example, give good clues as to the type of stone used for the memorial).

Even so, many lichens in the same habitat look very similar. Luckily some change colour in the presence of certain chemicals (such as potassium hydroxide or bleach), so lichenologists carry round a small battery of chemicals for testing the lichens. Janet showed the Group how potassium hydroxide brought out a bright red colour in the orange lichen Caloplaca citrina, whereas the very similar Candellaria species don't have this reaction.

As limestone is comparatively soft and easily dissolved, many lichens on limestone live within the outer layers of the rock, only a coloured stain and the spore-producing bodies emerging at the surface. On harder acid rocks like sandstone and granite the lichens are mostly outside, in frilly round patches. Lichens also grow on soil and on trees. They depend entirely on rainwater, so they are very vulnerable to pollution which slows their growth. However the growth rate of some lichen species in a particular locality is remarkably constant, so lichens can be used for dating in archaeology or for events like floods on river banks.

After examining lichens at the lime kiln and spoil heaps, the Group discovered different species on a sandstone wall. The whole top of the wall was covered by two lichens which almost always grow together, Lecanora sulphurea (greenish) and Tephromela atra (grey). Further on, in a dune slack where there have been recent fires, a "Pixie-cup" lichen, Cladonia chlorophaea was found. Nearby were lots of Dog Lichens, flattish leathery discs of grey and white. The name "Dog Lichen" comes from its likeness (not very obvious these days) to the froth produced by rabid dogs. This led to its use as a cure for rabies – for which it was totally ineffective. Most of the Dog Lichens at Cocklawburn were Peltigera membranacea, but a related species Peltigera canina was also present. Janet explained that this is only the fifth record for this species in Northumberland, and the first from this site.

Both mosses and lichens are usually known by their Latin rather than English names, mostly because the English names are not precise enough or there are several English names for one species. Conventionally species are known by the name first allocated to them, and as many older collections of mosses and lichens still survive in dusty museum drawers, discoveries of earlier names are sometimes made. This means the Latin name is changed, experts need to learn the new name and identification books become out of date. Geneticists are also delving into the family tree of lichens and mosses – two may look like closely related species but their genes say otherwise. This can cause more confusion.

On 14th September, we visited Kyloe Woods, with the Head Forester Ian Robinson and Save our Squirrels Officer Mark Wilkinson. 25 people found their way to the starting-point at the edge of the wood. The sun wasn't shining, but it was neither rainy nor windy, in fact excellent weather for this "summer".

Kyloe woods once belonged to Captain Leyland who lived at Haggerston, a sea captain who sent seeds home from all over the world and grew a huge variety of trees, including of course the infamous "Leyland Cypress". The 1000 acres (400 ha.) of Kyloe Woods was planted between 1890 and 1910, with a variety of mostly coniferous trees. About 20 conifer species make up the bulk of the wood, which is unusual among British conifer forests in that about half of the trees are about 100 years old – and very good they look, too.

The variety of coniferous trees make an ideal habitat for red squirrels. Red squirrels' native habitat is deciduous woods, but these are now occupied by grey squirrels which spread squirrel pox, fatal to the reds. The larger grey squirrels cannot live in conifer woods, but the smaller reds can, making sizable conifer plantations a useful refuge even if the habitat is not as "good" as broadleaved woodland. There are thought to be between 40 and 60 red squirrels in Kyloe Woods, and although a commercial forest, Kyloe is managed with the needs of the squirrels in mind. Felling takes place in small areas in autumn and winter so there is always somewhere for the squirrels (and other animals) to retreat to. Replanting aims to continue the variety characteristic of Kyloe, including Sitka spruce, Douglas fir, Corsican pine and a small number of more exotic conifers.

In many cases the trees seed themselves and where possible these seedlings are incorporated into the structure of the woodland, thinned to about 1000 per acre to start with, ending with a density of about 200 per acre as the trees grow. And grow they do – we saw some very impressive trees. Among the largest are the Giant Redwoods (although they haven't quite reached the age and size of American specimens), and there are graceful Western Hemlocks, magnificent blue Firs (Grand, Noble and Spanish), a thriving population of Monkey Puzzles, and rarities like the Bishops Pine from North America and the Oriental Spruce from Turkey (whose seeds are particularly popular with the squirrels).

We saw a couple of squirrels' dreys, large bundles of sticks which (unlike birds' nests) are by the trunk of the tree rather than the ends of the branches. A family of squirrels usually maintain several dreys, moving between them when parasites build up or danger threatens. A squirrel pair can have up to four "kittens" twice a year, and although the population can crash in poor seed years it can build up again quickly. They are seldom seen, but Berwick Save our Squirrels Group has put special squirrel feeding boxes around the wood, with sticky patches to remove a few hairs from each visiting squirrel. When examined under a microscope, hair from grey squirrels is round in section but red squirrel hair has a distinct groove down one side, so they know the squirrels in Kyloe are native reds. Signs like cones with all the scales pulled off so the animals can get to the seeds reveal their presence. Squirrels always start at the blunt end of a cone, pulling off the scales as each layer is revealed. (Mice also eat cones, but are not strong enough to pull off the scales, they bite them off more neatly).

Squirrels are not the only animals to take advantage of these quiet woodlands. Roe deer are plentiful (with occasional escaped red or fallow deer), pipistrelle bats have a summer roost in an old hut, and adders bask in sunny spots at the edge of roads in spring. Birds feed in the treetops (the "seep seep" of goldcrests gave them away), birds of prey nest on crags in the forest, and in summer nightjars breed on a small area of heath kept clear of trees especially for them.

Thanks to Ian's and Mark's expert guidance, our visit gave us a real insight into the woods at Kyloe. Also, thanks to the generosity of members, £66.86 was collected for Save our Squirrels. It is wonderful that Captain Leyland's exotic plantation is now home to so many native creatures, and that skilled and sympathetic management is allowing them to thrive. Long may this continue.

Fiona. September 2008

On July 13th, Malcolm Hutcheson led members of Berwick Wildlife Group and their guests on a butterfly walk at Cocklawburn. We were particularly pleased to be joined by Jaci Beaven of Butterfly Conservation and Roger Norman, the Butterfly Recorder for Northumberland. BWG members have been conducting weekly butterfly surveys at Cocklawburn and the numbers seen have been fairly low. This was, however, to change.

Saturday was a glorious day, with a light wind, very favourable to butterflies. The ground was a riot of colour, principally pinks and yellows of geraniums and vetches, although harebells and spikes of viper's bugloss gave touches of blue. The flowers provide the nectar on which the butterflies feed, and different species of butterfly need a range of flowers for nectar and individual food plants at the leaf-eating caterpillar stage. The different plants in their turn grow on different soils, so the variety of soil types at Cocklawburn supports a good variety of butterflies and, indeed, moths.

There were many species flying. We saw male and female Common Blues. The sexes in this case are very different ( the males an iridescent sky blue and females dark brown shot with blue) so it is possible to tell them apart easily. There were good numbers of Meadow Browns (milk-chocolate brown with orange on the forewing) and Ringlet (plain-chocolate with several small "eye-spots"), and some Small Heaths (orange with grey). Silver-Y moths were about, and a large number of black and scarlet Burnet moths, most of them the usual 6-Spot Burnet but some the rarer Narrow-bordered 5-spot. Disappointingly, there were no Grayling or Small Copper butterflies, which both occur at Cocklawburn. They may yet appear. Wood Sage was in flower and, since this is a nectar source for the Hummingbird Hawkmoth, it would be worth looking for it here.

As a footnote, the Speckled Wood butterfly has been sighted near Detchant Wood at what must be, at present, the northernmost limit of its range. It seems to be moving north like several other species, so it is worth looking out for this along hedgerows and woodland edges. Please let us know if you see any of them.

Molly. July 2008

On Sunday 22nd June 6 members of the Group travelled down to Stanton Hall Gardens, 5 miles NW of Morpeth, for a walk and talk about bumblebees.

There we met Shaun Hackett, a Northumberland National Park Ranger, who explained that although he was not a bee expert his job surveying and managing meadows had sparked an interest in bumblebees and had led to his becoming the foremost expert in the Park's organisation.

Shaun started by giving us a brief description of the 6 most common bees to be seen in gardens in our area. They are the :-

• Buff-tailed bumblebee -- Bombus terrestris

• Common carder bumblebee -- Bombus pascuorum

• Early bumblebee -- Bombus pratorum

• Garden bumblebee -- Bombus hortorum

• Red-tailed bumblebee -- Bombus lapidarius

• White-tailed bumblebee -- Bombus lucorum

During one of our Butterfly walks at Cocklawburn in 2007, we came across a smaller and brighter specimen of the Common Blue (Polyommalus icarus) than the norm. This small form has come to light again this year, so I have managed to photograph it and with much delving into past Butterfly writings and modern references, have come up with a good discussion………

The best reference I have come across was George Thomson's "The Butterflies of Scotland, a Natural History", published in 1980. In this book he describes the Common Blue in detail and mentions two overlapping subspecies. One is P. icarus subsp. mariscolor, an Irish form which is basically larger and brighter and is double-brooded. It has been found mainly in western and northern Scotland as well as Ireland. The second subspecies is P. icarus subsp. septentrionalis, a Scandanavian form which is single brooded and covers the rest of Scotland and Northern England.

These forms are shown on Plate 18 in his book. I have note the similarity to the specimens collected in western Borders in 1979 to the small specimens at Cocklawburn. However, Thomson describes them in detail in his book and comes to the conclusion that "subspecies differentiation without a careful analysis of all the factors and characters involved is not considered justified". To the casual observer, what seems to be a clear difference in subspecies could be the difference in variation between Spring and Summer broods, or an incursion and overlap of the Irish subspecies at Cocklawburn.

Unfortunately no studies have been done into the variations of the Common Blue across Britain and surprisingly there is no mention of subspecies differences in the Millennium Atlas.

So we have an unsolved mystery. Is the small Common Blue at Cocklawburn an incursion of the Irish subspecies, or is it a genetical variation between Spring and Summer broods?

Malcolm Hutcheson. July 2008.

On 5th June, in a fair degree of sea haar, Aisling Lanning, Marine Site Officer for the Berwickshire and North Northumberland Coast European Marine Site, led about 20 members of Berwick Wildlife Group and guests in an investigation of the shore at Cocklawburn. Ian Kille, a member of BWG, gave a brief introduction to the geology of the area, emphasising the connection between the underlying rocks, the plants which the resultant soil supports and the animals which find their food growing on that soil. This part of the coast dates back to the Carboniferous, some 345-280 million years ago. There are many fossils in the rocks dating from this time. Ian collected fragments of crinoid from the loose shale and showed how they fitted together to form a “sea lily”. Despite its name, this is an animal, not a plant.

Down at the shore, Aisling showed us several types of seaweed. These are classified as “red”, “brown” and “green”, although the names are not necessarily descriptive: a “red” seaweed may be purple, green or yellow. The other “colours” also vary. This is extremely confusing to the novice! Among the “brown” weeds are the Fucaceae. The different species within this group may interbreed, making identification even more difficult. One very attractive species found around the edge of rock pools is Corallina, named because of its resemblance to coral. Bushy, it is pink underwater with white tips.

We were fortunate to find starfish, shore crabs, a spider crab, red, green and pink anemones, a small purple jellyfish and keelworms, together with some of their discarded cases. Chitons, which despite looking like woodlice are really molluscs (like snails and octopods) , were clinging to the underside of rocks. True relatives of woodlice, (isopods, flattened front-to-back like woodlice; and amphipods, flattened side to side) whizzed around in the pools . A dab, a small flatfish, buried itself in the sand at the foot of a rock pool.

Perhaps the heading should have been “Some of the Secrets of Cocklawburn”. There are many more to see.

Molly June 08

Some further sources of information

Two Small Mammal Surveys in September.

When John took some of Berwick Wildlife Group’s records down to the EYE Project in Newcastle he discovered that there were few records of small mammals in North Northumberland. Being the dedicated naturalist he is, John set out to remedy this and organised some surveys at Cocklawburn Dunes and Tommy the Miller’s Field. Since my acquaintance with Britain’s small mammals was limited to 4 mice who had invaded houses and a rat that I decided against dissecting way back in the 60’s, I thought this would be an interesting, if slightly nerve-racking, activity.

We started at Cocklawburn where I was introduced to the intricacies of putting together a Longworth trap. Sliding one metal box inside another sounds relatively easy. That was my first mistake. There are flaps to engage and places to position. If at first you don’t succeed … At this stage we were not trying to capture the animals, just accustom them to the traps, and we encouraged them to investigate by putting in some food. Since blow-fly larvae are expensive and difficult to source, we substituted meal worms which didn’t smell nearly so bad. Sultanas, maize and chopped nuts were added along with some bedding. It is important not to use anything which might grow, introducing alien species. The doors to the traps were fixed so that they would not close. Ten traps were set in this way, all marked so that we could find them again, GPS readings were taken and a sketch map of the site was made. We then repeated the exercise at Tommy the Miller’s. By this time even I was getting the hang of fitting the traps together. On Tuesday and Wednesday mornings the traps were checked to see if any food had gone (in every case it had) and more food was placed.

Thursday was the big day when the traps were to be set live so that we could find out what was taking the food. This time pieces of apple were added to provide any captured animal with some moisture. I didn’t make the 6am and 7am settings, but did take part in the 10am, 2pm and 6pm checks and missed the 10pm one. When, at 10am, we lifted the traps whose doors had closed, we tried, fairly unsuccessfully, to guess what was inside. We opened the traps inside a large plastic box to avoid any premature escapes. Our “guests” didn’t really like this and made jumps of Olympic standard in an effort to get out. Each was identified as to species, and then put into a clear plastic bag so that we could weigh it and check for sex, amazingly difficult, and parasites. Each was set free in the area of the trap. The traps were then reset. This was repeated at the later checks, although the traps were not reset at the last check.

The week gave me my first encounters with bank and field voles, common and pygmy shrews and wood mice. I found them fascinating, attractive little creatures and not at all the scary creatures I had imagined. I look forward to the next survey, some time in the Spring.

Molly, Sept 29th 2009

Small Mammal Surveys.

On Thursday 2nd July 4 members of Berwick Wildlife Group met at Cocklawburn Dunes for a training day with Veronica Carnell of the Northumbria Mammals Society.

We started of in the car park learning about voles, shrews and mice and the intricacies of the Longworth live trap, how to take it apart and put it back together, harder than you might think. Veronica also gave us ideas of the best places to place traps, how to bait them and what happens when you make the traps live and how to handle the little critters. Above all she stressed that their welfare always comes first and although they will be stressed for the short time we handle them they must always be returned alive and well to where they were found.

We then set out ten traps along the slope beside the gun emplacement, setting the doors so they would not close, putting in local vegetation for bedding, baiting them with food that contains no invasive species that could generate and contaminate the study area and positioning the traps in deep undergrowth that sheltered the traps and gave cover to any small mammals living there.

Over the next five days we returned and checked the traps. All of the traps apart from one had their bait removed so were re-baited and replaced.

Finally Veronica returned and we set the doors of the traps live, returning three hours later to check them and see if we had caught anything. With the very first trap our hearts raced as the door was closed, but when we checked it we found it empty.

However the very next trap again had been tripped. Carefully, under Veronica’s watchful eye, we placed it in a large polythene bag and opened the trap. A tiny bundle of energy tumbled out and after a little fumbling it was trapped in one corner of the bag. A common shrew. The next stage was to hold it by the back of the neck and transfer it to a small polythene bag for detailed examination. My job and I had never realised how hard it is to get hold of such a tiny bundle of dynamite. A total failure so Veronica stepped in and showed us how easy it was. A very healthy juvenile female. After weighing we released her into a large box to admire her before releasing her back at the spot where she had been trapped.

Out of the ten traps there were 4 common shrews and 2 bank voles and we all mastered handling, examining and weighing them before they were all released unharmed back to the wild.

Veronica was very pleased with the results as there has been very little survey work undertaken on small mammals in north Northumberland. Andrew Craggs of Natural England on Holy Island is also very keen for us to do some further survey work to compare the species found on the island and the mainland. We can’t wait.

John, July 9th 2009

Our Group has campaigned for and organised the placing of two information panels at the access points to Little Beach at Berwick-upon-Tweed. They have been put there to inform beach users about the importance of this beach to wintering waders and to try to reduce disturbance to these birds.

For thousands of years, ever since the last ice age, the east coast of Britain has been a winter feeding ground for a great variety of species of wading birds, and Little Beach is proving to be one of Northumberland's best.

Sanderlings, Godwits and Purple Sandpipers all fly hundreds of miles from their breeding grounds high up in the Arctic circle to spend their winter here whilst others such as Dunlin, Curlews and Redshanks all nest inland high on the moors and spend the winter on the coast.

With the Pier and the cliffs providing a wind break, the rocky reef providing a sheltered environment for marine life in the mud and sand and the tidal systems bring in food twice a day it is no wonder that Little Beach is proving absolutely vital for the birds and so popular with bird-watchers.

It is recognised that Little Beach is also popular with holiday makers, dog owners and walkers and with fishermen digging live-bait, but from September to May give some consideration to our migrant birds. Many of them have flown great distances to share our beaches, and they cannot go home to a warm house and food.

They brave the elements for 24 hours a day and get their food where they can find it. These birds must feed whenever they can to survive the cold and build up fat for migration in spring. When disturbed they burn vital energy and reserves by flying and having to stop feeding, reserves that may make the difference between them living or dying.

Please try to disturb the birds as little as possible during the winter months when they must feed whenever they can to survive the cold and build up fat for migration in spring. If they are repeatedly disturbed in cold weather they weaken and die.

John Inglis, January 2008

Whales are large, magnificent, intelligent, aquatic mammals. They breathe air through blowhole(s) into lungs (unlike fish who breathe using gills). Whales have sleek, streamlined bodies that move easily through the water. They are the only mammals, other than manatees (seacows), that live their entire lives in the water, and the only mammals that have adapted to life in the open oceans.

In recent years whales have become more common in the seas around Berwick, with many sightings reported each year.

Some of the species sighted during 2007 were:-
Bottle-nosed dolphins
Risso’s dolphins
Harbour porpoise
And Minke whales
(See the log for 2007 below.)

One of the best places to look for whales is at St Abbs Head and although they can be seen at any time of the year they are more numerous during August and September.

Cetaceans are not easy to see, especially when there is a swell on the sea. Often the only view one has is of a small fin (particularly if it is a porpoise), and if the sea is rippled in any way that can be easily hidden.

The best way to conduct a watch is to continually scan the sea surface with the naked eye, interspersed at intervals with binocular scans.

During the scans, either with the naked eye or with binoculars or telescope, look for any disturbance of the sea surface. More often than not this will be the result of a wave breaking the surface, but it is generally the first sign of a cetacean as it surfaces. Watches are best conducted on calm days when there is little surface turbulence for this very reason. If waves are continually breaking it becomes very difficult to pick out instances when the surface has been broken by a whale or dolphin. If seabirds are seen circling or diving in an area, it is worth checking these out with binoculars since dolphins or whales may well be associated.

This conference, under the auspices of Castle Morpeth Borough Council, was held in Stannington Village Hall on 5th October. His Worship the Mayor, Councillor Milburn Douglas welcomed the delegates.

Lord Redesdale, from the RSPP, told us that the grey squirrel, Sciurus carolensis, is listed by the UN as one of the 100 most invasive species on the planet. Native to North America, they have been introduced into Britain and are rapidly displacing our native reds (Sciurus vulgaris). Because greys have evolved to feed on the large seeds of broad-leaved trees they can out-compete the reds which eat smaller, and therefore less energy-rich, foods. In addition, the greys carry the squirrelpox virus which is harmless to them but fatal to the reds. The RSPP has cleared Newcastle and Jesmond Dene of greys and hopes to eradicate them completely from Northumberland.

Richard Pow, from Red Alert North England and the Forestry Commission, then spoke. RANE started by trying to understand the ecology, behaviour and habitat preferences of the two species of squirrel, and the interspecies competition. After this research, it was decided to establish 16 reserves for reds, surrounded by buffer zones 5 km in depth. There is some discussion as to whether this depth is sufficient. Northumberland is of great importance to the red squirrel: of 14 000 in England, 9 000 are in Kielder.

Carri Nicolson of Save our Squirrels spoke about the complementary roles of RSPP and SoS, Nick Brodin talked abot the implications of red squirrel conservation for the Regional Biodiversity Action Plan and Elaine Jaggs followed with its reference to the Northumberland BAP.

In the second section of the conference, Councillor Andrew Tebutt explained the importance of tree-planting policies to favour food sources for the reds and the provision of rope bridges over roads, to avoid road-kill. Richard Wales, of Red Squirrels in South Scotland, reminded us that 75% of the UK's red squirrels actually live in Scotland. In the UK as a whole there are 160 000 reds and 3 000 000 greys. Squirrelpox has only recently spread to Scotland by "English" greys travelling North carrying the virus. Nothumberland, as a border county, is therefore extremely important in the fight against the virus. There is a programme of blood sampling to determine whether any grey squirrels found are carrying the virus.

Sally Hardy and Penny Hewitt described how they had set up Ponteland Red Squirrels, conducting local surveys and raising funds to promote urban red squirrel conservation in Ponteland and Darras Hall. Philippa Mitchell informed the conference that SoS can give advice on obtaining and setting up rope bridges and on matters such as public liability insurance.

The afternoon programme consisted of 3 workshops: Philippa Mitchell and Carri Nicolson spoke of getting the public involved in reporting sightings and educating people to help reds. The telephone number to report sightings of reds or greys is 0845 347 9375.

Richard Wales and Gordon Robinson, the latter from the Squirrel Protection Partnership, gave instruction on trapping greys, sending blood samples off for pox analysis and running a trap loan scheme.

Save our Squirrels Conservation Officer Mark Wilkinson desribed land management for reds including tree-planting and felling schemes and the maintenence of amenity grounds to encourage reds a nd protect grey invasion.

Considerable thanks are due to the sponsors of the conference, including Lord Ridley, Groundwork Northumberland, Morpeth Town Council, NPIL Pharmaceuticals and Wansbeck District Council.

Thursday 19th of July 2007 saw the 'Ugly' group (Beach Litter Surveyors for Berwick Wildlife Group) back in action for the second survey for the Marine Conservation Society in the 'Adopt a Beach Scheme'. Little Beach and the Pier Road Beach were again examined along a 100m stretch. It was a typical summer's day - overcast with an easterly wind blowing. It was freezing!

When Duncan Hutt took Berwick Wildlife Group on a tour of Ford Moss Reserve, an exciting find was an "aggregation" of mining bees, busy outside their nest holes in a sunny bank. These were almost certainly Colletes succinctus (there is no English name). They have distinctive bands of pale dense hairs on the abdomen, and feed mainly on heather flowers.