Kemerton Lake Nature Reserve

In 1985 a feasibility study was carried out to check the availability and flow of water through an area of Adrian Darby’s farm that contained extractable deposits of sand and gravel.  This showed that the water table was sufficiently high for the creation of a lake, post-extraction.  This was chosen over the more economically viable option of restoring the site as farmland, because it was felt that the site’s location in the Avon and Carrant river catchment gave it the potential to become a regionally important wetland nature reserve.  Work began in 1987 and the final landscaping was completed in 1997.

The 54 acre (22 ha) reserve includes a diverse range of habitats including a 15 acre (6 ha) lake (eutrophic standing water), reedbeds, islands, pools, seasonal wet scrapes, woodland, hay meadow and arable ground.  A public footpath gives visual access to much of the site and an additional permissive path is opened seasonally.  The reserve is very popular with bird watchers and two hides have been constructed for public use.  As of 2007, more than 170 species of bird have been recorded here.  It is a breeding site for many birds including lapwing, redshank, pochard, and reed warbler; as well as the BAP priority species skylark, reed bunting, and turtle dove. It also attracts a wide range of passage migrants, and in winter is an important roosting site.  One of its most exhilarating spectacles is the enormous evening roost of starlings in reed beds. 

Various practical research programs have been established at the lake, which include the establishment of mining bee habitat and the introduction of woodland ground flora.  Part of the site is sown annually with a sparse crop of linseed, wheat, rape, borage and phacelia in order to provide habitat for arable wildflowers, and a winter food source for seed-eating birds. 


Developing reed beds

From 2002 to 2003 grants from the Severn Waste Environmental Fund (using funds from the Landfill Trust) enabled KCT to employ a full-time nature warden at the reserve.  In 2004 English Nature (now Natural England) provided further funding from the Aggregates Levy Sustainability Fund to continue the development of the reserve.  This funding is set to continue until March 2008, enabling the Trust to study in greater depth how 'brown field’ sites can be helped to evolve for the benefit of wildlife.

Beggarboys

Although only 7 acres (3 ha) in extent, Beggarboys is an extremely rich wetland complex with ancient origins.  It includes a large pond, extensive sedge beds, willow coppice, wet woodland, deciduous woodland and glades.  Its diverse flora includes sweet galingale and narrow-leaved birds-foot trefoil.  One of the glades produces over a thousand flowering spikes of cowslip in the spring.  It is home to nationally rare invertebrates, including the club tailed dragonfly – one of twelve species of dragonfly and damselfly which breed here. Numerous hoverflies and butterflies are attracted to the water mint and fleabane, including small copper, common blue and small tortoiseshell.  The site is home to slow worm and grass snake.  Birds found here include snipe, bullfinch, kingfisher, tufted duck, mandarin and wintering water rail.

Far Frankwells pond
   
A pond and lowland fen were created in 1985 by excavating a wet-lying corner of an arable field.  A few key plant species were introduced from Beggarboys and the Carrant Brook, while others colonized naturally.  It now has a diverse flora and rich insect fauna.   In the spring the surrounding scrub provides good nesting habitat for warblers and finches.  Green sandpiper has been recorded here during the winter.  Management is confined to regular monitoring and occasional control of invading scrub and other coarse vegetation.