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Well, it has officially been a dry January….. not just for those carrying out New Year resolutions, but also in terms of rainfall ?️

We’ve been examining the historic rainfall records held by the Met Office for the monitoring station at Manston, and it has certainly been an unusual month – a mere 15.6mm (0.6″) of rain, compared to last January when we had 90.5mm (3.6″). In fact this was the driest January for 22 years!

So what does this mean for the woods? We are sometimes asked where our water supply is, and we point at the clouds…. so a lack of rain can be an issue for our young trees.

However we counter this by planting saplings (generally no taller than 1.5m), which need less water to establish. Thanks to our homemade mulch mats and woodchip, precious moisture is retained; and by removing competing vegetation around the planting area, our young trees can maximise the benefits of all available rainfall and sunlight ?

These methods appear to be working in terms of the survival rates, but that won’t stop us doing a rain dance!

Today marks a significant milestone for Dane Valley Woods. For the last six months we have been working hard on developing a Land Management Plan in conjunction with White Horse Ecology, and we are excited to reveal that it is now complete and ready to be shared with the community. So, what is a Land Management Plan? Well, it serves a number of purposes:-

• to guide our work over the next few years
• to summarise our progress to date
• to describe habitats and the wildlife found within
• to set out our ethos, what we want to achieve and why
• to supply land management information to the landowner (TDC)
• to support future funding applications
• to summarise all the above in an easy to read format

The plan is not intended to be static, and the success or otherwise of the various objectives will be reviewed, as we adjust to community feedback and the ever changing site conditions. The main headlines are as follows:-

✅ smaller scale tree planting, with a greater emphasis on tree maintenance
✅ glades and open areas for people and wildlife
✅ habitat interventions such as reptile refuges, dry hedges and bird boxes
✅ control of invasive species
✅ extending the path network in the woods
✅ public engagement events and site interpretation
✅ investigating an upgrade in designation to a Local Wildlife Site

Click on the links below to read the full Land Management Plan and the associated Work Plan.

On a fine January morning last Sunday, the newest trees were introduced to the Woods, when our volunteers planted a wide variety of 65 native trees. A huge thank you to our sponsors Curve Roasters for raising and donating the money through product sales to buy the fledgling trees, as well as keeping our volunteers going with their delicious coffee!

We will be returning each month to help these new trees to grow, and willing volunteers are always welcomed to come along and help – find out more here on our volunteer page.

After doing a voluntary litter pick last month at the woodlands, 1^st Margate Cubs were thanked by Secretary Kashmir Flint, who also did a talk about waste, its problems and how we can all help to reduce it. Every year, England and Wales produce enough waste to cover Hyde Park in 80 foot of rubbish, which is around the equivalent of 4 double storey houses! A lot of this waste ends up in natural areas or in the sea where it harms wildlife, with the RSPCA receiving over 7,000 calls over litter-related incidents every year.

But as Kashmir explained to the attentive Cubs, waste is a problem that we have created, therefore it is a problem that we can solve! Using the waste hierarchy, we can reduce, reuse and recycle, often in fun and creative ways.

Waste is an issue closely tied with Dane Valley Woods, from both its past and present. Dane Valley Woods was an old landfill site, as a result, we often find odd items when digging around! Whilst this is great because it is now covered in emerging woodlands, we care about the environment and do not want to see all our natural spaces being covered in landfill sites. Waste is also a present problem for us, as the site is a main route through Dane Valley, therefore we are constantly battling with litter. We spend many task days litter-picking, which consumes voluntary time and effort.

The Cubs kindly helped us by using their time to litter-pick at the woodlands and giving us a kind donation, to which we are incredibly grateful.

Our secretary and media manager, Kashmir Flint, has been talking about her role and the benefits of volunteering…..

“Being a full-time student isn’t always easy and after all the essays and exams, we need experience to get onto the job ladder. To gain this experience, you get a job and to gain a job you usually need experience. It’s a vicious cycle and no wonder that many students end up frustrated.

But as I have found out, volunteer work can often provide invaluable experience that will hopefully land me in a dream working placement. I’m entering my third year of a Wildlife Conservation degree at the University of Kent, and hope to be employed as an ecologist after graduation. This job market is competitive and skills are often essential. This is how Dane Valley Woods is helping me out.

The project is found in the heart of Margate and was established in 2002, on land formally used as a rubbish tip. The council owned land is managed by the Dane Valley Woods volunteers, who have heroically braved the winter planting season each year since its establishment to plant over 4,000 trees on the site. They meet on the last Sunday of each month to help maintain the site through various tasks such as bramble clearance and mulching around trees to help prevent weed growth. Since joining the group in June 2011, I’ve been fascinated at the wide range of wildlife found at the site, and have recently started to add to the list of species recorded in order to give an almost complete audit of biodiversity.

I’m hoping that both my practical experiences in maintaining the woodlands and species identification as well as managerial skills gained through my role as secretary will help me to stand out against a crowd of graduates, all applying for the same vacancies. But the woodland doesn’t just help me. Dane Valley Woods is a community wild space and is open for everybody to enjoy and use. The volunteers established a memorial garden in 2013 for the public to plant trees for loved ones. Wildflowers have been planted at the site for aesthetics as well as for the insects and tasks such as Easter egg hunts and summer fetes have been held to engage the public.

However, Dane Valley Woods is in urgent need of volunteers to help the upkeep of the site. Task days are held on the last Sunday of each month from 10am until 2pm, meeting outside the Dane Valley Woods HQ, at the Dane Valley allotment site and volunteers are given free tea and coffee after their hard work. The group have a website address which can be found at www.danevalleywoods.org and we can also be found on Facebook or Twitter, where you can see many of the photos that I have snapped myself at the site.”