Dean Green Team

Wildlife Conservation Group in the

Forest of Dean

Gloucestershire

28 October 2014

Clearwell Meend

Grid Ref SO577080

This week at Clearwell Meend we were on the top of the hill to clear the ponds which had loads of willow re-growing as we had not done the ponds for nearly three years. This is a regular job for us to do and it is annoying to find yet more rubbish in the ponds including an old watering cans and bottles. The weather was brilliant and a large team of us split in two.

This demonstrates how overgrown the pond was again so all the surrounding willow, bracken and bramble was removed.

This is the other pond which was very shady to start with and has a lot of spagnum moss covering the water so by opening it up to the sunshine it should soon flourish again.

The main pond was finally cleared and the far side in this photo, which had been totally smothered in young willow, is now open. Water lilies and irises can be seen in the foreground.