fascines and fish stocks - microsoftbtckstorage.blob.core.windows.net/site3421/misc/lackie... ·...

Fascines and fish stocks

CONSERVATION ANN LINGARD

What links ‘waste’ brash from hazelcoppicing with the survival ofsalmon and sea-trout? KathleenRobertshaw, coppicer at the Hay BridgeNature Reserve, had been wonderingwhat to do with the brash – the twiggybits that aren’t much use for anything –that was stacking up, until she read anarticle about using it for stabilising riverbanks. As an active conservationist her-self, it didn’t take her long to contact theSouth Cumbria Rivers Trust (SCRT) –and the link to improving the lives ofyoung salmonids was established.

Kathleen learnt the craft of coppicingon various courses, but, she says, “Iwanted a place where I could workrather than just keep going on courses.”Hay Bridge Nature Reserve was lookingfor someone to help manage the wood,and she was taken on as a volunteer: thiswill be her third season working in thecoppice wood. Hay Bridge has been anature reserve for about thirty yearsand has been through periods of beingallowed to ‘grow wild’ – during whichthe unmanaged hazel coppice becameovergrown (‘overstood’) – and, sincethe John Strutt Foundation bought it,

being managed for wildlife. A mixtureof fen, woodland and grassland, it’s wellhidden within the Rusland valley. Inspring the wood is busy with the activ-ity of chaffinches, tits and siskin; awoodpecker drums and two buzzardsmew overhead. The reserve has manyspecies of mammal from otters andvoles to roe and red deer – the latter all

A hazel stool with one season’s growth

JULY 2012 33

Cumbria_July_Layout 1 12/06/2012 14:47 Page 33