First signs of spring down at Athelney as the flood waters slowly recede. Help us secure all this land for nature by donating or becoming a member. www.somersetwildlands.org/support
Big bag of cans. And not in a good way. And plastic and building materials. All collected from about 15m (?) of roadside verge near one of our small reserves (it has a sliver of land which approaches a road). We’ve got to find a way to do better on roadside little. Anyway I picked up what I could.
A huge orange lorry lying sideways in a Somerset rhyne
@somersetwildlands.bsky.social here’s your truck today…
Hopefully no one was hurt!
Joyous paddle around a flooded Athelney last week. In summer all this is dry… right now it’s under several metres of water in places… BUT we can only rewild places like this with your help! www.somersetwildlands.org/support
As the flood waters start to slowly recede in the Somerset Levels we'll be keeping an eye on what emerges in the coming days and weeks. In the meantime here is a link to a few of our recent flood videos and commentaries on our website. www.somersetwildlands.org/news/floods
The Levels have always flooded of course but the winter rains do seem heavier and the summers drier.. the long term forecasts are distinctly moist.
As the flood waters start to slowly recede in the Somerset Levels we'll be keeping an eye on what emerges in the coming days and weeks. In the meantime here is a link to a few of our recent flood videos and commentaries on our website. www.somersetwildlands.org/news/floods
You can see here how there are now clumps of scrub protruding through the flood waters… in years to come perhaps this will be some kind of flooded forest in winter. somersetwildlands.org/support
Joyous paddle around a flooded Athelney last week. In summer all this is dry… right now it’s under several metres of water in places… BUT we can only rewild places like this with your help! www.somersetwildlands.org/support
While it can be hard for local businesses, water is a big part of what makes the Somerset Levels special. In the future it looks likely it will be even wetter too. By making space for nature we can protect some areas and allow something wonderful to emerge in others through rewilding.
While it can be hard for local businesses, water is a big part of what makes the Somerset Levels special. In the future it looks likely it will be even wetter too. By making space for nature we can protect some areas and allow something wonderful to emerge in others through rewilding.
Not sure what’s happened here, but we suppose that’s why they say not to drive through flood waters. Rewilding site looking amazing though. Hopefully the diesel doesn’t leak. www.somersetwildlands.org
Not sure what’s happened here, but we suppose that’s why they say not to drive through flood waters. Rewilding site looking amazing though. Hopefully the diesel doesn’t leak. www.somersetwildlands.org
After two hours we found one! Harvest mouse nest on the new Clark Fields site. So it’s great to know they are around, albeit in small numbers. Great scope for them to expand as the site wilds up. Thank you so much to our volunteers who came along and to Simon for leading! www.somersetwildlands.org
Also in Somerset, one of the fields owned by @alasdaircameron.bsky.social in the Somerset Levels that forms part of the @somersetwildlands.bsky.social network (2/4)
Ooh. Beautiful, aside from anything else.
Big flooding down at Athelney today… the whole area acts as a vast water storage reservoir in times like this. This was me kayaking over the fields a couple years ago… hoping to get down shortly.
Lovely. How did you manage to find it? In fact, harvest mice are the only mammals in the Old World (or eastern hemisphere, if you like) that has a prehensile tail. Other than them it’s only some species of New World primates.
To be clear - the footage of the mouse on a hand was from a captive bred populations back in 2019. Not a mouse we found today. We would never hassle a mouse in winter.
Two hours of searching through the grass. Should stress - the live mouse was from a captive bred populations years ago. Just there to show what they look like! We wouldn’t take a live mouse from its nest in winter!
We’ve found harvest mice at other sites in our network but it’s great to see them here too. We’ll be looking for more in the future as well. If you’ve not seen one they are beautiful and the only mammal in Britain with a prehensile tail. They climb like little monkeys.
In the end we found 2 harvest mouse nests. Still a few areas to survey on this location. Also lots of field vole nests which are more like little huts.
After two hours we found one! Harvest mouse nest on the new Clark Fields site. So it’s great to know they are around, albeit in small numbers. Great scope for them to expand as the site wilds up. Thank you so much to our volunteers who came along and to Simon for leading! www.somersetwildlands.org
This would be just fantastic. Let’s make it happen. Very keen to see them return to the Somerset Levels soon too.
Need more eels in your life? Of course you do. Just under a week to go until our online talk on the Somerset Eel recovery Project. Tickets are £10 or free for members, and you can become a member from just £5 a month. Bargain.
www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/eels-are-g...
Glorious icey day on our Athelney rewilding site. It’s really beautiful at the moment. Lapwings, snipe, many egrets, herons, starlings, field fares, stone chats, teal etc etc… just a wonderful day. Help us secure more land like this for nature, for everyone, at www.somersetwildlands.org
Glorious icey day on our Athelney rewilding site. It’s really beautiful at the moment. Lapwings, snipe, many egrets, herons, starlings, field fares, stone chats, teal etc etc… just a wonderful day. Help us secure more land like this for nature, for everyone, at www.somersetwildlands.org
Thank you to everyone who tuned in to our pelicans event last night - we'll keep you posted with the carbon dating from the bones when Lucia is able to publish. In the meantime why not sign up for our next talk on EELS in January? As ever it's FREE FOR MEMBERS! www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/eels-are-g...
Happy New Year to everyone and particularly to all our members, supporters and well-wishers. Here’s to a wilder, more biodiverse and brighter 2026.
