Across these eight sites, Staffordshire Wildlife Trust will deliver three main types of habitat improvement works.
Grassland Improvement Works
Staffordshire is lucky to have lots of beautiful greenspaces, but often these places may feel a lot more wonderful and natural than they actually are for wildlife. That’s why much of the works being done as part of this part of this project will focus on grassland improvements near our brooks.
What does that mean exactly? Well, just like a person should have a balanced diet with a variety of food types, a healthy grassland needs a balanced habitat – a habitat with a variety of species. Most amenity grasslands, grasslands we use as parks or for recreation, lack a healthy diversity of species. They contain maybe a handful of common grasses and plants.
The grassland work we do over the course of this project will include extensive scarification (raking) of the ground to expose soils, and make it easier for wildflower seed to grow amongst the existing grasses. Once that part of the work is done, the wildflower seeds will be distributed using a mixture of hay as a medium and harvested seed to transform a basic grassland into a beautiful lowland meadow.
Lowland meadow is a type of grassland of UK importance for wildlife which has a much bigger variety of plants that will attract pollinating insects, like bees, butterflies, moths with beautiful blooms. Not only will this be nicer to enjoy than a sea of the same boring grass, it will also mean a much healthier habitat for wildlife.
This kind of work is good for nature in general, but as a town with lots of nearby farming communities, healthy pollinators are really important for Stafford. It means nearby farms, gardens, and allotments will have thriving insect communities to pollinate crops planted for food. If this kind of work was to be scaled up across the UK it would help improve food security.
Keep in mind, the areas where works take place will look messy before new meadow plants establish. Nature needs time to flourish. We expect to see plants growing after the first year of clearing work, but these kind of meadows can take about five years under careful management to fully establish and look their best. The exact time frame will vary from meadow to meadow depending on the type of soil in the area and other environmental factors, like seasonal weather.
Wetland Enhancement Works
If you’re familiar with Stafford, you’ll be familiar with flooding issues that local residents face. Seasonal flooding and wet weather will always be a challenge in this area, the town was built on a wetland after all. However, there is conservation work which can help ease the severity of flood risk to properties by capitalising the natural function of a floodplain to provide space for water.
Wetland enhancement works can greatly improve the quality of naturally wet habitats along rivers so that these environments are healthy for wildlife too. This work is all about evaluating how water best sits and moves across different areas of land, and where it naturally wants to be in wetlands. By using natural solutions which will complement traditional hard engineering, water can be encouraged to pool where it’s most convenient for wildlife and people.
For example, as part of this work Staffordshire Wildlife Trust will make pools in specific places where we know it will benefit water loving creatures like dragonflies and wading birds. This will also help keep portions of land wet all year round, which provides a much needed source of water for wildlife during times of hot weather and drought. Conversely, in wetter seasons, it will encourage water to remain in the pools which will be intentionally made away from homes, businesses, and roads. Pools will still overflow with extreme amounts of rain and flooding, but the effects will be less severe than if the pools did not exist at all.
Keep in mind, the more this kind of conservation work is done in the area, and further across the UK along our river corridors, the more flood risk can be reduced overall. Working to get the land healthy again, with a variety of water-loving trees and plants, will help it absorb and hold water more efficiently, storing it like a sponge. This helps slow the flow of water during times of heavy rainfall.
River Re profiling
Similar to wetland enhancement, this work will help water move through the landscape in a more natural way, but it is specifically about the flow of a river. Conservation professionals sometimes call this “re-wiggling rivers.” The work will involve using big machinery to move earth and create a different shape to a particular stretch of the river. This work will encourage the flow of water in a river or stream to “wiggle” throughout the landscape, slowly, as opposed to speeding through the landscape in a straight channel. This can help to lower the peak water flow at pinch points where water might collect in more undesirable locations.
The work also allows us to make shallow banks along the bends in a river. Shallow banks are important for hosting riverway plant life and encouraging breeding grounds for fish. Young fish in particular need this shallow bank habitat to rest and feed on insects. They can’t do this if the water is too deep or fast-flowing. In turn, some young fish will be an important food resource for some of our most beautiful beloved birds, like kingfishers.
Keep in mind, this kind of work can look intense with big machinery and site closures. In the wrong circumstances, this kind of work is harmful to nature, but in this case, the works programme has been designed specifically to help nature recover long term. Contracted work for this project is being overseen by Staffordshire Wildlife Trust conservation professionals who have completed licencing permissions, surveys, and feasibility studies in the first phase of the project ensure it is being delivered in the best possible way to benefit wildlife.
Just imagine it
It can be hard to envision how the works will change these sites in the future. As they say, pictures are worth a thousand words, so below are some general examples from Staffordshire Wildlife Trust on how similar works have been carried out previously. Please note though, that every site is unique and not every process which was applied at the sites pictured will be applied on Stafford Brooks sites. For example, Shawcroft was ploughed before wildflower seed was laid, and this is different to scarifying which is what will happen on Stafford Brooks sites.
Example 1. Previous grassland works at Shawcroft
