A Letter From Our Conservation Officer

Dear LOS Member 

You will probably already know that Wigan Council is consulting with various stakeholders about future plans for Pennington Flash. The aim is to put together a "Masterplan" and there have been some quite radical ideas going about. We know people are worried about the introduction of new "leisure pursuits" which could potentially be damaging to the habitat and disturbing to the wildlife. 

The Greater Manchester Ecology Unit, working with an Ecology Consulting firm called "Footprint Ecology", has put together a dedicated reporting page for Pennington Flash, and we would like to encourage all birders who visit Pennington to report their sightings via this web page. This is a particular push for 2020, and part of the focus is to get more data about what happens to birds when there is disturbance in any part of the Country Park. So please report ANY species of bird, mammal or insect, but of particular interest are any unusual sightings or unusual concentrations of birds in a particular location. For example, if there's a sailing race happening, you may see 32 Great Crested Grebe on the water in front of Ramsdale's reedbed. The web page allows you to report this down to that amount of detail, by means of a clickable map. 

This is the special feature of this data gathering - it needs to be very detailed as to where things are seen. Much of what is on record at GMEU, for example, is just down as "Pennington Flash" and does not indicate where in the Country Park something has been seen. 

The web page is really easy to use, although the map does take a little while to load. You don't even have to register - just insert your name and email address - but if you do register and login, you won't have to enter those details every time. Everything else is pretty much self explanatory. 

This is the link to the data entry web page 

Here's a link to Footprint Ecology

Members have expressed a little suspicion about bringing in outside ecologists. Please be reassured that this is not a big firm which works for big developers - the two consultants involved have both been keen birders from a young age, and their work is almost exclusively for local councils and nature conservation groups such as the Wildlife Trust. I have spoken at some length to Durwyn Liley of Footprint, and will be meeting him in early December. He is more than ready to listen to LOS and others from the local area, and to use our records as well as those generated during the survey year. I think it is a positive sign that the Council have commissioned this survey before rushing into development of the Country Park or additional leisure projects. 

I hope you will consider contributing to the survey whenever you visit the Flash from now and through 2020. 

Thanks! 

Paul Richardson 

Conservation Officer