Breathing Spaces Reports

lotteryblue Abernyte Community has been awarded £7112 to carry out improvements to the Glebe Millennium Walk.

This grant has been awarded by the Big Lottery Fund Breathing Places Campaign to:

• Make pathway improvements,
• Improve biodiversity through planting
• To undertake a major programme of bird/bat boxes in the Glebe Millennium Walk and surrounding area
• Introduce nest box video onto the Abernyte.org website.

The directors of Abernyte Community Company and the Committee of Abernyte Heritage Group wish to thank everyone for the tremendous community effort in completing the Breathing Places project. We can all now enjoy the improved access to the Millennium Walk and the increase in wildlife in that area which will follow the placing of the bird and bat boxes. This is only the beginning and other improvements will follow. If you wish to suggest further improvements to the Glebe area please use the contact us section of this site.

Breathing Spaces Application

Pre-application Survey

Abernyte Glebe
The planting done in 2000 is now well established and growing well, as an example of our achievements, siskins have recently been feeding on cones on the alder that we planted in the top, at the north east corner. The nesting potential however of the glebe is low. The Ash trees along the east edge and the few scattered over the glebe may provide a few natural nesting cavities for birds such as tits or tree sparrows. The vegetation here is composed of relatively few flowering species, those present include woodsage and foxglove, in a rough grassland. This is good habitat for small mammals, but is probably not as good a habitat for many insects, but it has the potential for improvement. Planting a range of flowering plants, to act as nectar and pollen sources, and food plants for insect larvae, would help improve the butterfly and moth diversity, and improve the site for many other insects. An improvement in insect number would in turn provide a food supply for nestling birds. The combination of restricted food supply and shortage of nesting sites is going to be a restriction on number of birds nesting on the glebe.

The majority of the trees are located at the western end, but here we identified only a single large ash, all the rest are sycamore. The understorey here is typical of a sycamore woodland with a very dense canopy. It is virtually devoid of shrub layer, we found elder and a single holly seedling, and the ground layer includes green alkanet and a sparse distribution of grasses. It is uncommon to find nesting cavities in young sycamore, and this is the case here. The introduction of nest boxes would provide artificial nesting cavities where no natural cavities exist. But this area is not only deficient in nesting sites. It is well known how few species of insects are found on sycamore (15) as compared to the number found on a native tree species say oak (284)1. Combined with the heavy shade, the lack of a diverse ground flora, and a shrub layer, has major implication for the number of birds that would be likely to nest in boxes provided in the sycamore. A bird will be more likely to nest in a site that provides both a good nest site and a good and close supply of food for the young in the nest. Providing nest boxes in the sycamore without other work would be likely to result in a very low occupancy. We think that two actions would improve the nesting potential of this area a lot. First some selective felling of a few trees, well below the number that would require a felling licence. The objective would be first to open up an area in the middle of the stand to let in some light and create a clearing, and secondly to open up a ride from this clearing to the outside edge. This felling may be better done over more than one year. The wood produced should be cut and stacked to provide much needed habit for a woodland insect community that because of the slope and the sycamore monoculture is lacking. Starting a planting programme with new native trees (oak and ash) to replace some of the sycamore will improve the future nesting potential a lot, but this will take time to achieve any impact. But is that a reason not to start? With more light allowed in it becomes viable to plant a shrub understorey, reinforced by marginal planting and a ground flora. The shrubs could be a mixture of holly and honeysuckle with marginal plantings of hawthorn & blackthorn. All these provide a good nectar and pollen source for insects and later a berry crop for birds. I think planting hazel should be avoided as it may attract grey squirrels.
A planting list for the ground flora could include primrose, Dryopteris ferns, bluebell etc.
Cavity nesting birds that would benefit from the provision of nest boxes would include, blue and great tit, tree and house sparrow, these species already have breeding populations in the locality. Tree sparrow numbers have declined dramatically (-93% Long term trend 1970-2005) over the last 3 decades nationally and are the subject of a UKBAP (UK biodiversity action programme).2
Species nesting in the area that would also benefit from the habitat improvements recommended here and are also the subject of a UKBAP include Song Thrush, Bullfinch, spotted flycatcher.

Bats may use a number of different sites throughout the year. I do not think it is likely that we are going to offer an attractive hibernation site, but we may be able to offer summer roost, nursery or mating sites to the local bat population. These artificial sites are important as the number of natural sites is continuing to decrease, but we should also include in our long term planning the intention to eventually produce natural sites. The tree planting above will help to contribute some natural roost sites as these trees mature. A number of bat species are found in the area, both species of Pipistrelles, Daubenton’s and Natterer’s and Long Eared Browns, and all have been reported as species that use bat boxes at some stage during the year.

While researching the best design of bat box to recommend for the project, it was apparent that few studies of the attractiveness of various designs, or even effect of construction material on selection by bats has been published.. Each bat group that I looked at, had its own favourite design of box, but no comparisons had been made with other designs. We have the opportunity here to put up a number of different designs of box, and variety of construction materials and to compare the results.

Bird boxes are much easier to recommend. Woodcrete boxes have an expected life span of 20 - 25 years. They offer substantial protection for the nestling from the weather, predation from woodpeckers etc, and inspection of the nestlings is easy and quick, both features are important for minimising disturbance to the birds and important when you have a lot of boxes to examine. But it is important that we also engage the interest of people in Abernyte of all ages. We need young people to make wooden nest boxes and get these boxes put up and then follow the progress of their box. The main job of the wooden boxes is to generate an interest in wildlife in the person who makes it.

To maximise the interest, we would like to have one or two nest boxes with web cameras on them so that we can follow all the action at a nest. It would be good if we can have say a camera on a blue tit nest and a swallow nest. Blue tits only produce a single brood so the action period would only be about 13-14 days incubating and about 22 days before the young leave the nest. Swallows often produce more than one brood so we could have longer to watch. For the webcam we will need to find a location away from the glebe, as that would prove far too difficult to engineer. If we can solve the technical problems of where to site boxes for transmission of images to the Abernyte community website, I would hope we can generate additional local interest in the project.

We have spoken to members of the Perth bat group and members of the Tay ringing group, and both have offered a variety of help and support.

To involve as many people as possible we need to organise walks through the glebe to introduce people to the species that are using the area.
A summer event is envisaged checking the contents of nest boxes, ringing nestlings, checking for use of bat boxes.
1. The Number of Species of Insect Associated with Various Trees
T. R. E. Southwood
The Journal of Animal Ecology, Vol. 30, No. 1. (May, 1961), pp. 1-8.
2. The State of the UK’s birds 2006 http://www.bto.org/research/pop_trends/state_uk_birds.htm

Application to Breathing Spaces Fund

If you wish to read the application submitted to the Breathing Spaces Fund, click here to view it.

Swallow Cam

The camera is now back in place for a new breeding season, unfortunately there has been a distinct lack of breeding pairs this year. One pair have nested, probably as a second brood, and are incubating six eggs at the moment. They have also picked the darkest and most inaccessible corner for the nest.
Maybe next year!

Click on the photograph to get a larger image.

Breathing Spaces Updates

Access Path Improvements

The access path into the Millennium Walk has now been upgraded and a fine all weather path installed. It's a great improvement and grateful thanks are due to all who worked on the arranging of it.
duringsmall aftersmall beforesmall

Abernyte Glebe Millennium Walk
Bird Nest Box Building Event
Sunday 1 March 2009
Follow up activities

Once you have built your bird nest box today we are keen to hear about any birds that show interest. On www.abernyte.org a link to a Nest Box Update page has been created that contains information about some of the commonly sighted birds in this area which might make your box their home.
Here are some things you can help us with:
1 Erect your nest box in a good location;
2 Take a photograph of it;
3 You can upload your photograph to the www.abernyte.org website;
4 Record on the Nature Watch pages of the website what birds use it and
5 If no birds use it this year, can you tell us why you think this might have happened?

The Breathing Spaces project is now completed for this year. Further events later in the year are planned on the Glebe and will be notified by WhatsOn email or via this website. For now, enjoy the walk and the wildlife!

Breathing Spaces Projects

These are the main projects that will be undertaken during the 12 months of the Breathing Spaces Funding. Volunteers to assist with any of the tasks are most welcome!

Access and pathway improvements - Malcolm McSwan Path completed

Environmental survey - Barry and Cathy Caudwell Survey completed, further surveys ongoing

Selective pruning and felling of trees - Barry Caudwell Selective tree clearing completed

Nest and Bat Box procurement and erecting - Barry and Cathy Caudwell Boxes all procured, 50% installed

Website alterations - Gordon Nicoll Website changes in place

Installation of web cam and connectivity - Gordon Nicoll Swallow cam in place and pictures available on web site

Nest box building day for young people - Anne Davis Nest box building carried out, great success

Post project Environmental Survey - Barry and Cathy Caudwell Work to be carried out on a planned schedule

Final Report and project management - Helen Richardson End of Project Report submitted

End of Project Report

A condition of receiving money from the Big Lottery Fund is that a full report on how the money was spent must be submitted to Breathing Places, one year from receipt. Here is the End of Project Report.

Abernyte Community Company
Breathing Places: End of Grant Report

URN:BRE/3/010283183

Introduction
Following notification of the successful award of grant from the Big Lottery Fund Breathing Places a Joint Group of Abernyte Community Company Directors and Abernyte Heritage Group Board Members was established to oversee successful expenditure of the award in line with the notified terms and conditions.
This group met on ten occasions and each of the meetings were minuted and copied to all members of the Joint Group. One of the first actions of the Joint Group was to prepare a programme for each area of award with timescales and assign an accountable lead person to progress and report on work at future meetings. The Lead member would also work in conjunction with other members of the local community to achieve their targets. In this manner a greater community involvement and ownership of the project was achieved. The subsequent meetings of the Joint Group then monitored progress towards targets, agreed variances and resolved any issues arising.
A presentation on the award and planned projects was given at the Annual General Meeting of Abernyte Community Company on 2 September 2008 to raise awareness in the community about the intended improvements and to seek comments on the proposals. The proposals and action taken were also presented at the Abernyte Heritage Group AGM.
This governance structure allowed the project to proceed within the wider context of events happening in the Abernyte Community, greater awareness of the work being undertaken as part of the Breathing Places award, achieving intended outcomes within timescale and complying with the terms and conditions of the award.

Section1 Spending your Grant

Item/activity	Total Cost	BP grant expenditure
Pathway	3643.75	2593.75
Clearing and felling	850.00	610.00
Nesting boxes	3809.41	2538.41
Plants	971.65	221.65
Box building event	505.99	175.99
Webcam	1100.62	800.62
Monitoring	2978.58	171.58
Totals	13852.00	7112.00

The total cost include for estimated labour time as indicated in the grant application form. The major variance was in the cost of monitoring the project. As outlined above there was a Joint Group set up as part of the governance framework to oversee the appropriate implementation of the award funding. Directors and members of Abernyte Community Company and Abernyte Heritage Group Board met on a frequent basis to ensure the project met the deadlines set.

Section 2 The benefit of your grant
Please give details blow of the ways your project has made a difference.

Breathing Places Outcomes achieved
Outcome 1 – the natural environment of the breathing place is developed to encourage plant life and animals

The following actions were envisaged in the application:
Improve the biodiversity of rough grassland though thinning of trees, planting more appropriate tree species, planting a range of flowering plants to encourage insect diversity and improve food supply for nesting birds.
Targeting of red line species to use the Glebe Millennium Walk as we are aware of some in the local area
Reintroduce native trees as part of the planting programme
Provide habitats to encourage birds to nest and summer sites for bats to roost, mate and rear young
Use of professional advice to ensure all proposed developments will enhance the biodiversity in the area.

Action taken
Clearing felling and bird/bat boxes
Trees have been thinned through the clearing and felling programme targeting the non-native species that were growing on the Glebe Millennium Walk and appropriate plants, purchased through the plants project have been planted throughout the Walk.
Bird and bat boxes have been purchased, built, numbered and were erected all over the site in the early spring and we are pleased to note that some are in use this year.

Species List found on Glebe Millennium Walk
The attached species list from the recent survey attached as appendix 1, ( http://www.abernyte.org/index.php/Wildlife/species-abernyte-glebe.html ) reveals the extent of wildlife now present on the Glebe Millennium Walk and should be read in. conjunction with the survey submitted as part of the application. It is gratifying to note red and amber line species are present on the Walk and insects have been seen using the plants as a food source.
Professional advice was sought from local and national groups including Scottish Wildlife Trust Dundee and Angus Branch, Perth Bat Group, Tay Ringing Group, Dundee Naturalists and individual experts and this also led to other volunteers giving their time to survey the Walk. As envisaged as part of the application, this work will continue to provide benefits in future years and it is intended to keep monitoring the growth and use of the Walk by birds, bats and insects and provide these reports through the www.abernyte.org website and to national biodiversity groups.

Outcome 2 People in the local community make more and better use of the breathing place

The following actions were envisaged in the application:
Better access for all with improved access for people with partial or limited mobility
Availability of information on the website
Encourage more groups and individuals on countryside runs to access the Glebe Millennium Walk through generating publicity about the improved facilities at the walk.

Action taken
Footpath
A footpath was planned using expert advice from Paths for All and Scottish Wildlife Trust.
Installation of the footpath makes accessing the walk more attractive as instead of the uneven, waterlogged grass path a level, safe surface has been installed up to the lower level of the Walk.
With the events that have been run as part of the Breathing Places programme more people are aware of what the Walk has to offer and more visitors have been seen at the Walk. Toddlers and infants in pushchairs can easily access the Walk and enjoy the pleasant surroundings and views, an activity that was not possible before due to the roughness of the path. Before and after photographs of the walk are attached as appendix 2 or can be viewed/downloaded on this link http://www.abernyte.org/index.php/Breathing-Spaces/

Stile and geocache
At the top of the walk a stile was put in to join the Glebe Millennium Walk to an informal path that leads to the top of Abernyte Hill. A geocache is located in the area above the walk that attracts more visitors from outwith the immediate area due to publicity on the geocache website. There are some favourable comments on the geocache website log entries expressing appreciation of the view.

Website
The www.abernyte.org website contains a lot of information about the Glebe Millennium Walk as well as useful birds and bumble bees identification assistance. The website also contains a nature watch section where local people can enter their information and note sightings in the area and at the Walk.

Outcome 3 People in the local community are more engaged in developing and maintaining the breathing place

The following actions were envisaged in the application:
Anticipate a greater awareness beyond the parish of Abernyte bout the Glebe Millennium Walk and more people accessing the facilities
Also anticipate more people willing to become involved in maintaining the wider range of facilities and an increased interest generated through attracting more wildlife and flora in the area. There is already a core group of people who assist with the annual maintenance of the walk. One aim is to attract red line species to the Glebe Millennium Walk as we know there are some in the local area
The supplementary and linked project not seeking funding through this application will involve local residents in building and placing bird/bat boxes in their gardens and it is intended that these will be monitored, recorded and reported on as an extension to the research work taking place on the Glebe Millennium Walk. This will engage local people directly and encourage further interest in the Glebe Millennium Walk.

Action taken
The www.abernyte.org website was further developed with easy navigation to provide updates to the community on progress with the Breathing Places projects. Regular reports on progress were uploaded throughout the year. The website contains the breathing places application and pre award survey, swallow cam, updates on the projects together with the project leaders for volunteer to contact to offer assistance.

Swallow cam
Swallow cam on the www.abernyte.com website has been made available as a direct result of the Breathing Places Award. Grant funding was spent on purchasing and installing a camera that relays photographs of nesting swallow straight onto the website. Installed soon after the grant award, the cameras were able to stream photographs of swallow raising a second brood in Summer 2008 and these images remained on the website over the year. Photographs of the swallows are attached as appendix 3.

Annual Maintenance
See appendix 4 for full report or enter this website link
http://www.abernyte.org/index.php/Abernyte-Community-Company/millenniumwalkmaintainance.html

The annual maintenance of the Glebe Millennium Walk took place on 19th April 2009 with volunteers weeding, trimming and pruning, path and step building and general tidying. A risk assessment had been prepared for the event and the necessary requirements actioned in advance.

Nest box building event
See appendix 5 for full report or enter this website link
http://www.abernyte.org/index.php/Abernyte-Community-Company/nestboxupdate.html
The nest box-building event took place on 1st March 2009 and attracted three times the number we had predicted. The local countryside ranger from Perth and Kinross Council provided assistance and support for the nest box building and members of the Joint Group together with community volunteers organised an environmental hunt. A risk assessment had been prepared for the event. Due to the large turnout it was necessary to split the attendees in two with one set hunting on the Glebe Millennium Walk while the others built boxes with a swap over half way through.
After all the boxes had been built they were taken home to local gardens and erected.
Great positive feedback was obtained from the participants and this is included within appendix 5.
A range of suggested follow up activities and assistance with bird identification were posted on the www.abernyte.org website and a link established to the wildlife reports section. If birds nested in the box children were encouraged, with the help of adults, to upload their photograph to share this information.

End of Grant Award gathering
The end of grant award gathering at the Glebe Millennium Walk took place on June 7th 2009 and was coupled with a dedication of a bench generously gifted and donated to the memory of a member of the local community who sadly recently passed away. Around 50 people attended this event in glorious weather and as well as hearing about the work undertaken were able to enjoy the improved surroundings. See photographs in appendix 6.

Future Guided Tours
As a result of requests made at the end of project gathering it is proposed to offer guided tours of small groups of people to explain the improvements made on the Glebe Millennium Walk and offer further educational opportunities.

Report on the Big Lottery Fund Breathing Places Award
A report on the outcomes of the project will be presented to the Annual General Meeting of Abernyte Community Company in September 2009.

Photographs are attached in the appendices to this report or can be viewed/downloaded from the www.abernyte.org website.

How many people have benefited from the award? 500+

Greatful thanks are due to Helen Richardson for compling this report and her management of the Breathing Places project.

Abernyte.org and Abernyte Community Company

Breathing Spaces Application

Swallow Cam

Breathing Spaces Updates

Breathing Spaces Projects

End of Project Report