Spending your holidays in the Algarve? Don’t forget the dragonfly fauna!

You may be planning to spend your next holiday walking and birdwatching in the Algarve, southern Portugal. But did you know you can see numerous species of dragonflies in the region?

Please take a look at www.odonata-algarve.info which contains detailed information about all the species, flight periods and distribution of Odonata throughout the Algarve.

The aim of the site is to encourage the recording of Odonata across the region.

Please share your DAILY SPECIES LISTS with us to enable the Odonata in the Algarve database to increase, as we try to map the distribution of this Order across the region.

Many thanks in advance and we hope you enjoy watching and recording dragonflies during your holiday!

complete record includes:

– species (latin name)

– life stage (larva or exuvia or adult)

– date (DDMMYYYY)

– co-ordinates (from Google Earth)

– name (and email) of the data supplier

– additional information and/or photographs

To send the records, please contact:

Nuno de Santos Loureiro (PhD)

Universidade do Algarve – FCT

Campus de Gambelas

8005-139 FARO (Portugal)

email: nlourei@ualg.pt

The sale of five species of invasive aquatic plants has recently been made illegal. More information of these plants that are causing damage to native habitats can be found at the following link:- https://secure.fera.defra.gov.uk/nonnativespecies/beplantwise/knowwhatyougrow/index.cfm

Anyone wishing to get involved with reporting these can find more information at http://planttracker.naturelocator.org/

A dozen large-scale nature areas have recently been unveiled by the Government as part of efforts to boost wildlife, help rare species and restore habitats. It is hoped the twelve areas, ranging from northern Devon to the Humberhead Levels, will restore wetlands, grasslands and peat bogs, improve rivers, plant trees and make new ponds.The “nature improvement areas” will share £7.5 million over three years in order to help local groups carry out work to improve, increase and link up networks of wildlife sites in their regions, in a bid to encourage threatened and declining species.

Environment Secretary Caroline Spelman said: “Each of these projects has something different to offer. The exciting wildlife projects are the result of different organisations all working together with a common purpose – to safeguard our wildlife for generations to come.”

Two of these areas are Yorkshire sites and they offer great opportunities to conserve and enhance the dragonfly fauna in our area.

The Humberhead Levels NIA will develop community capacity to get involved with wildlife sites. This will operate in three distinct ways; i) improved interpretation and face to face contact on five sites with existing visitor infrastructure will encourage an extra 6000 visits to local wildlife sites over the next three years, ii) new environmental education programmes will operate from three different sites in the area and; iii) targeted volunteer development and training will deliver an extra 3910 hours of volunteer input. Better integrated land use will make the area more resilient to climate change. Closer partnership working will align farming with more sustainable flood defence, water supply and biodiversity conservation. The impetus provided to the local green economy through, for example, our work on biomass to energy projects, could provide new jobs and sustainable development opportunities in an area of multiple deprivation within 10 years. This could increase work for conservation management contractors and for green tourism employees from cafe staff to nature guides. Connecting local communities to their wildlife sites will increase independence from central government funding and increase local pride and stewardship, foster social wellbeing and provide significant health benefits.

The Dearne Valley Green Heart Nature Improvement Area will help local people deliver their vision to restore the ecological functionality of the river Dearne, its floodplain and its link to habitats on surrounding sandstone and limestone hills. The vision is to create a 1300ha core of wetland and woodland habitats which will be buffered by 2690ha of open land and reclaimed industrial areas whose biodiversity areas will be enhanced. This will link up core areas and target farmland areas of poor ecological functionality covering 1700ha.The restoration areas will cover 500ha of semi natural grasslands, new woodlands and wetlands. It will also enhance 1150ha of farmland and 150ha or woodland areas through targeted advice in the poor ecologically functioning zones. A landowner and farmers working group has been set up to increase farmer involvement in the project.There will also be an extensive community outreach programme through the “Hidden Gems of the Dearne“ project.

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You may be at risk from Lyme Disease when you visit the countryside. Lyme Disease is a relatively uncommon infection in the UK but it has recently started to occur more frequently. It is caused by a bacterium carried by ticks. People who walk in the countryside, especially those walking through grass, rough vegetation or wild areas such as heathland, are more at risk.
For more information visit the following wesbites:-

Lyme Disease Action

Tick Bite Prevention

The Killer Shrimp Dikerogammarus villosus was found at Grafham Water in Cambridgeshire earlier this year, it has now been found at two sites in Wales. Below are some links giving further information with regards to the potential threat from this species.

BBC News – Invasive ‘killer’ shrimp found at two sites in Wales

Currently people using the waterbodies containing the shrimp are being advised to clean any equipment used in the water thoroughly. Claire Install, Conservation Officer for the BDS, recently attended a meeting, where someone described the situation at Grafham, it sounded like the water was (or is) teeming with the shrimp.

The following link to an information sheet about the shrimp, produced by the Environment Agency below, this refers specifically to Grafham Water:

Invasive Shrimp Briefing Note

The link below is for an identification guide for the Killer Shrimp, it has been produced by the Freshwater Biological Association.

Identification of Dikerogammarus and other British Freshwater Shrimps

The link below will take you to the non-native species secretariat webpage about the shrimp, it will give you some further information if you need any.

Killer Shrimp – Dikerogammarus villosus

If you spot a killer shrimp, the Centre for Ecology and Hydrology have an e-mail address to send any reports of sightings and images along with details of the location and your contact details.  The e-mail address is: alert_nonnative@ceh.ac.uk

Keith Gittens (VC62 Recorder) has had an article published in the MOD’s Sanctuary Magazine covering the dragonflies of Strensall Common. Sanctuary is an annual publication about conservation of the nature and historic environment on the Defence Estate. The most recent issues of this publication can be downloaded from the link below. Keith’s article appears in Issue 39 part 1.

Sanctuary

The East Riding of Yorkshire Council have opened up a public consultation for the East Riding of Yorkshire Biodiversity Action Plan.

Paul Ashton – VC61 Recorder has represented the British Dragonfly Society as a partner to the plan.

The following five species were submitted based on Local Importance, i.e. being recorded in less than 10% of all recorded tetrads.

Small Red-eyed Damselfly Erythromma viridulum
Variable Damselfly Coenagrion pulchellum
Hairy Dragonfly Brachytron pratense
Common Hawker Aeshna juncea
Black Darter Sympetrum danae

More information can be found on the East Riding of Yorkshire Council website at East Riding of Yorkshire Biodiversity Action Plan Consultation.

The Million Ponds Project will create an extensive network of new ponds across the UK. Ultimately the aim is to reverse a century of pond loss, ensuring that once again the UK has over one million countryside ponds.

A critical element of the project is that these new ponds will have clean water. This is important because most countryside ponds are now badly damaged by pollution, and evidence shows that pond wildlife is declining across the UK. Making clean new ponds is one of the simplest and most effective ways to protect freshwater wildlife.

For more information visit Million Ponds Project on the Pond Conservation website.

Over the winter period there has been some large scale work to drain parts of Skipwith Common. Over recent years mining subsidence has resulted in some areas of the common becoming flooded. These floods were the areas south of the road at the eastern end of the common and the central woodland area. The work has been done to prevent further loss of the dry heathland. There are no plans to drain any of the historical ponds on the common. Hopefully the resulting drainage will not have an impact on the old ponds.