Take some time to give some time.

We couldn’t have asked for a more beautiful winters day as we set off onto the Wilden Marsh Nature Reserve in Worcestershire for a spot of volunteering. Armed with some no-messing-about looking tools, we headed out to see what our day’s work was going to look like.

Colin setting off onto the marsh as part of our volunteering commitment.

Wilden Marsh is an important nature reserve for the 192 species of birds that have been recorded there, alongside toads, otters, badgers, foxes and many marsh plants that are now uncommon elsewhere including marsh cinquefoil, marsh arrow-grass, marsh pennywort, lesser water parsnip and southern marsh orchid.

This expanse of nature left to its own devices would become overgrown and would lose a lot of its diversity, so in order to manage the grounds, our job today was to clear as much of the shrub-land as possible.

You can do a lot with a pair of loppers and a saw!

The joy of being allowed to attack shrub-land armed with heavy duty loppers, scythes and saws is that you can hack away with a wild abandon that one can only dream of whilst trying not to kill the rose or other plants in the garden at home - at the same time knowing that you are helping the environment.

As the seasons change, the jobs to be done on the marsh will likely change. I’m holding out for more hacking in the future (the thrashing of brambles with a scythe that could take someones head off is very cathartic), but whatever those jobs are, we will be taking the time to give some of our time.

It feels good to be connected, it feels good to contribute and by golly it feels good to get in the shower at the end of the day! Perhaps next time we will take our wellies….!

There are loads of volunteering opportunities available. If you are interested in supporting your local wildlife, the Wildlife Trust is a great place to start. Check out their volunteering page here:

https://www.wildlifetrusts.org/closer-to-nature/volunteer