Colchester Countryside Volunteer Rangers

Highwoods Country Park
Local Nature Reserve	150 hectares	At 150 hectares, High Woods Country Park derives from the once much larger medieval royal hunting forest of Kingswood. In more recent times farming and forestry has shaped the landscape you see today. Opened in 1987 after Colchester Borough Council aquired the land for people to enjoy, its rangers and volunteers look after the park for recreation, wildlife, education and historical interest. The park is a designated Local Wildlife Site (LWS).

Cymberline Meadows (inc Charter Woods)
Local Wildlife Site Farmland & woodland	74 hectares	Formerly part of Lexden Lodge Farm, this is a quiet, peaceful place to enjoy walks and picnics within easy reach of the town centre. The riverside meadows have been sown with wild flowers and now cattle graze them in spring and summer. Charter Wood was planted in 1990. Kingfisher can be seen along the river and Snipe in the wet meadows. Yellowhammer call from the tops of hedgerows. Banded Demoiselles are common in summer.

Gosbecks Archaeological Park and fields
Local Nature Reserve Grassland & farmland	65 hectares	A Scheduled Ancient Monument, Gosbecks lay at the heart of pre-Roman Camulodunum. Now it is mainly open grassland with wild flowers, surrounded by hedgerows and split in half by Olivers Lane, cattle graze the site. Large numbers of Skylarks nest here, and many other bird species visit. Insects make the most of the open sunny site, including bumblebees and lots of Small Heath butterflies.

Hilly Fields
Local Wildlife Reserve Grasslands, ponds & woodland	32 hectares	Supports a wide variety of habitats. Its free-draining grassland is important for insects, and Buntings Meadows provides ideal habitat for butterflies. Bats feed over the meadows and the ponds. Excavations in the 1930s and 1970s revealed extensive Iron Age and Roman remains, and most of the site is designated a Scheduled Ancient Monument.

Colne - Wivenhoe
Local Nature Reserve Woodland, grassland & marsh	32 hectares	Wivenhoe Wood is best in spring when it’s floor is a carpet of wild flowers. It has 16 tree species and is managed in the traditional way, by coppicing. This creates a patchwork of areas at different stages of regrowth, providing nesting habitat for Nightingales and Blackcaps. Lower Lodge was farmed until the 1980s and now is managed as grassland. It provides cover for lizards, sometimes seen sunning themselves on fence posts and tree trunks, and for grasshoppers and crickets. Paths are cut through for walkers and offer fine views over the Colne Estuary. Ferry Marsh is former grazing marsh with a network of brackish ditches, supporting a good population of Water Voles. Nesting birds including Reed and Sedge Warbler, and a Barn Owl patrols regularly at dusk. From the path on top of the sea wall many waders can be seen feeding along the river.

Salary Brook
Local Wildlife Reserve Grassland & wetland	19.5 hectares	This river valley supports scrub and woodland, marsh and wet grassland. Its wealth of wildlife includes species not often encountered in an urban area, such as doormouse, water vole and otter, and over 100 plant species including the rare Sneezewort.

Hythe Lagoons
Local Wildlife Site Grassland & scrub	14.3 hectares	Since dredging ceased in the 1970s, these lagoons next to the River Colne have become important for birds, with 101 different species recorded, 28 of them nesting. These have included Avocet, Little Ringed Plover, Redshank and Lapwing. The rough grassland provides a good habitat for insects. Badgers are frequent visitors leaving a tell-tale network of paths behind them.

Westlands Country Park
Local Nature Reserve Woodland & grassland	8.8 hectares	Created on the former Shrub End landfill site, this country park was capped and planted with trees in three phases between 1998 and 2002 and opened in 2007. It is owned by Essex County Council and run in partnership with Colchester Borough Council. An area of grassland is managed to encourage wildflowers, the cap being seeded with a wildflower mix when the site was first established. In early summer Common Vetch, Grass Vetchling and Meadow Vetchling can be seen, later in the season Bird’s-foot-trefoil, and Tufted Vetch appear. In areas of disturbed soil Bristly Ox-tongue and Teasel are common. Roesel’s Bush-cricket and Meadow Grasshopper can be heard in late summer. The trees have established well with the Hazel becoming mature enough to produce hazel nuts. The Oak plays host to all manner of insects including gall wasp larva; look out for Spangle Galls on the underside of Oak leaves. The Field Maple and Cherry leaves add colour to the site in autumn.

Lexden Park
Local Nature Reserve Woodland & grassland	7.7 hectares	Lexden Park is a haven for walkers and lovers of wildlife. To its east is an area of woodland on higher ground which is part of the Lexden Dyke earthworks. It puts on a vibrant bluebell display during April and May. The spring-fed ornamental lake is surrounded by trees and shrubs. The small island supports interesting wildfowl, and a small wildlife retreat has been fenced off for amphibians.

Bourne Valley
Local Wildlife Site Wooded wetland	5.7 hectares	A boardwalk linking Mersea Road and Old Heath Road runs through woodland beside Bourne Brook. The attractive brook is lined with willows and in places large numbers of Orb Mussels can be seen on its bed. Bluebells thrive on the drier slopes. The boardwalk passes Blythe Pond, a former mill pond overhung by willows and surrounded by wetland plants that provide cover for toads and frogs. Bats feed over the water on warm evenings.

Welsh Wood
Local Nature Reserve Ancient woodland	2.7 hectares	Welsh Wood is managed in the traditional way by coppicing – cutting the trees down to ground level on rotation. It has a carpet of bluebells in the spring, along with Yellow Archangel and Wood Anemone. Standing dead trunks are left for woodpeckers and wood habitat piles for Stag Beetles. Its larvae feed off decaying wood and can take 3 – 5 years before forming the adult beetle.

Lexden Springs
Local Nature Reserve Grassland & scrub	1.8 hectares	The meadow is rich in wild flowers, including Harebell, Pignut and Devil’s-bit scabious, and is alive with butterflies on sunny days. At the base of the slope is a pond fed by a natural spring – a stream from it leads to a marshy area.

Bull Meadow
Local Nature Reserve Grassland	1.4 hectares	Formerly grazing land, this damp meadow on the north bank of the River Colne has fine wetland plants beside its wet ditches, and a large patch of sedges in the centre. Bull Meadow is especially important for insects. Dragonflies and damselflies forage in the tall vegetation in the summer. Also found here are many bush-crickets, spiders and butterflies, and Britain’s largest beetle, the Stag Beetle.