World Wetlands Day

2 February each year is World Wetlands Day. It marks the date of the adoption of the Convention on Wetlands on 2 February 1971, in the Iranian city of Ramsar on the shores of the Caspian Sea. Each year since 1997, government agencies, non-governmental organizations, and groups of citizens at all levels of the community have taken advantage of the opportunity to undertake actions aimed at raising public awareness of wetland values and benefits in general and the Ramsar Convention in particular.

Wetland and Forests is the theme for this year's World Wetlands Day. Yesterday's photograph of Holme Fen would have been particularly appropriate to mark this, as it is a large birch forest on a peatland, with areas of mire and open water. However, I haven't been very far today, and so bring you one of my local herons instead - a familiar wetland bird, which relies on nearby woodland for breeding.

Acoording to Birds of Britain the heron's breeding season is prolonged and they will soon be seen soaring over the nesting wood and chasing one another, tilting from side to side and diving head-long. Endless display takes place on old nest platforms and consists of elaborate neck movements with crest and neck plumes erect and accompanied by bill-snapping and a variety of blood-curdling calls. All of our local herons breed in a heronry is a nearby area of woodland, several hundred metres from the river, which has no access to the public.

The rivers of eastern England are also noted for their pollard willows. 'Pollarding' means to cut a tree back at a height of about 2-3m, causing new shoots to grow. This process tends to prolong the age of the trees and may eventually produce veterans of great cultural and aesthetic value. Even from a relatively young age pollard willows are good for wildlife, particularly invertebrates. There's a fine row of pollard willows along my walk: these were becoming top heavy and beginning to shed branches. Today the local authority were busy re-pollarding them.

Ideally the long row would be managed on rotation, but I suspect that all of them will be done at once: local authorities seem to go for a rather all or nothing approach. It would also have been good to see some of the larger timber stacked, to allow deadwood invertebrates to emerge, but unfortunately everything was being shredded. Thankfully there are still plenty of other untouched willows along the length of the river, and in the end the management will be beneficial.