Our Valued Volunteers
Award-winning volunteering at Fingle
Take a guess. How many hours, days, do you think volunteers contributed to the Fingle Woods restoration project in 2018? We totted it up recently – it’s 5,000 hours. That’s over 666 working days, the equivalent of nearly three years for one person working full time! And quite rightly, our valued volunteers received a special recognition at last year’s Woodland Trust National Volunteering Awards. Read more about our valued volunteers here.
I caught up with some of these volunteers meeting on a sunny Wednesday with Fred Hutt, Fingle’s Ranger and Matt Parkins, who’s leading a Devon Mammal Group survey here. These volunteers are our Friends of Fingle. They meet on the first Saturday and third Wednesday of the month to share their love of volunteering and Fingle. I found out what this Wednesday group were up to and discovered what keeps them coming back to the Friends of Fingle group.Meeting in Cod Wood, Fred and Matt laid out their plans for today and what the Friends could opt to do. They had the tempting offer to join Matt to look for harvest mouse nests and presence, or stay with Fred and work on reducing the birch and conifer regeneration over a meadow. Some stay with Fred, wishing to remain faithful to the normal working party and task at hand. Others break off to explore a new side to Fingle that they haven’t yet seen, with the opportunity to contribute to some data to this Devon Mammal Group project (find out more about this project in Matt's blog here).This is quite typical of a volunteering day here at Fingle, and the range of activities available to the volunteers is a huge part of what brings them in on a weekly, and often a more frequent, basis. There's usually a practical management-related activity or two, perhaps construction or maintenance, alongside an increasing number of surveys and more monitoring activities as spring and summer ramp up and wildlife springs back into life. Some volunteers have a clear idea of what type of activities they want to be involved in, but many like to see what Fingle has to offer and focus on something a bit different every time.At the start of the day, none of the volunteers knew what a harvest mouse nest looked like, where to find one or how to look for them. Let alone the fact that the harvest mouse is our smallest rodent, which weighs a mere 6-8g! We weren’t expecting to necessarily see any of these furry friends today, but we were hoping to spot their nests once we learnt where and how to look for them.
As we arrive at Mardon Down, a tawny owl volubly greets us from the woods while we learn key information about harvest mouse ecology. What we’re looking for here is abandoned ball-shaped nests from last year, nestled at the bottom of tussocks of grass. If we get a conclusive harvest mouse dwelling, then we get to tick off a box on the map to say they’re present in the area! We busily yet diligently check the ground for these signs of life. All the while chatting about how learning these new things and digging around at ground level means that walks out on Dartmoor with friends suddenly become very different! Your mates wonder why you stare at tree branches or blades of grass when the plan is to be galloping along a route to get to the pub!We find a couple of nests – that we would have completely overlooked if we didn’t know what we were looking for. We’ve probably walked past hundreds, thousands of these nestling in tussocks before. We’re not yet sure if these are vole or harvest mice nests, but these intricately crafted homes are wonderful to handle and imagine what would have once lived within.
As we walk to re-join the rest of the Friends of Fingle, we chat about the training and opportunities that have been available to the volunteers over the last few years of this woodland restoration project. From training on butterfly surveying, improving botanical identification and surveying skills, to using tools, archaeological digging, first aid, working with schools… the list is endless, and ever-growing. This knowledge and training is then distributed between the volunteers organically, as they learn from each other and work together.We get cracking on helping Fred and the team to clear these small trees which are blocking light from entering the meadow below. Soon, we hope that these increased light levels will bring more floristic diversity to the open space below. This is a key part of the Fingle restoration project - providing different habitats across Fingle. This is one where butterflies are our focus, and we can’t wait to see more butterflies in this area when we survey in the future!
While working hard, we discuss what motivates some of the volunteers to contribute here. As well as the obligatory tea, coffee and biscuits, the volunteers cite “autonomy”, “trust” and “choice” as well as the mix of people who they work alongside, “I like the mix of ages, it’s not just older folk like me, but lots of young people as well”.If you join the Friends, expect those refreshments, breaks and chats to keep you going. But more importantly, the friendly and fun chatter amongst the group, and a strong sense of teamwork and achievement. Sometimes, like today, it’s a smaller group of 6-8 people. On other days, especially Saturdays it’s a larger affair. Expect fun, learning and a diverse mix of people from both the neighbouring villages and further afield.We want to hear from you if you have a love of Fingle, Dartmoor, volunteering, learning, teamwork, getting to know new people, skills and places, as well as nature, conservation and leaving something better and more beautiful than you find it. Get in touch with us by emailing finglewoods@woodlandtrust.org.uk with an idea of what you’re interested in. We’d love for you to join our award-winning team!By Emma Fancett
