Blyth Woods

When we took over the management of The Copse (the small triangle of wooded land on the North side of Grove Piece) one of our priorities was to restore the pond, which had become very overgrown and silted up, so the pond supported very little life. We were lucky to have Crispin Chalker, who is an expert in pond restoration, living nearby, so we asked him to restore the pond for us. Crispin dredged out the silt, that was up to 1.5 metres deep, cleared some of the surrounding vegetation to let in some light, and felled a couple of large dead ash trees on the boundary with Grove Piece.There was a problem in know what to do with such a large amount of silt but Jon Hunt, who owns the field adjoining Grove Piece, kindly allowed us to spread it out over the uncultivated part of the field. There will be a long dormant seed bank in and around the pond so we are looking forward to seeing what appears, not only in the pond, but also on the spread out silt. Stoneworts, which thrive in newly dredged ponds, are one group that we will be watching for, especially as one rare species grows in the Malster’s pond and even rarer species have been found in other recently restored local ponds. This spring, primroses, which had been almost hidden on the edges of the pond, burst into flower and around them a host of new seedlings promise an even better show next year.