Stirling Council Ranger Service Annual Report 2013

Introduction This report highlights some of the achievements of the Ranger Service over the past year and, where relevant, outlines our future approach.

Staff changes within the Ranger Service 2013 saw major changes to the Ranger Service, to both its staff and management structure, as another three members of the old Countryside Team left the Council and their posts will not be filled.

Dougie Flynn, Area Countryside Ranger - West has retired along with Robert Hunter, our Countryside Co-ordinator and Donald Balsillie, Land Conservation Team Leader. Kate Williamson finished her one-year placement and moved on to work as a ranger at Rouken Glen Park.

On the plus side Scott Mason got a 1-year extension to his apprenticeship and so will be with us throughout 2014. And we have 2 new faces.

For 2014 the Ranger Service consists of: Area Rangers Claire Bird and Jennifer Davidson, Apprentice Ranger Scott Mason and Biodiversity & Ranger Coordinator Guy Harewood, along with new arrivals Ryan Walker (Apprentice Ranger) and Fiona Watson (Community Archaeologist).

Ryan has joined the Ranger Service on a 2-year modern apprenticeship and is working towards an SVQ Level 2 in Environmental Conservation.

Fiona has joined the Service on a one-year placement from the Council for British Archaeology and will work closely with the Council’s archaeologist to deliver a programme of digs and activities.

Lantra Apprentice of the Year Awards On the 28th February 2013 our very own Scott Mason was named the Lantra land based learner of the year in Environmental Conservation. Scott has since gone on to complete his SVQ Level 2 in Environmental Conservation and has begun to work towards his SVQ Level 3.

Celebrating 40 years of Scottish Countryside Rangers Association 2014 - it’s not just the Year of Homecoming, the Ryder Cup in Scotland, the Glasgow Commonwealth Games, the independence referendum and the centenary of John Muir’s death! SCRA is forty years old in November 2014. They plan to celebrate this and to look forward to what they aspire to do before their 50th birthday. http://scra-online.co.uk/

'Follow' us on Twitter at https://twitter.com/#!/SCRangers

'Like' us on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/stirlingcouncilrangers

Above: Robert, Donald & Dougie

Below: The Ranger Team for 2014 from left to right: Jennifer, Scott, Ryan, Guy, Claire & Fiona

Scott with his award

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The Ranger Service runs a year-long programme of activities including a minimum of one action day or public event each month. We also work closely with schools, communities and partner organisations to deliver projects as well as giving talks to local groups. Environmental education and awareness raising

No Attendees School visits 36 744 Non-school groups 3 76 Total 30 1041 No Attendees Events 26 2133 Highlights from this year include ‘Bark in the Park’ which brought 1200 people, and their canine companions, into Plean Country Park and our ever popular city centre ‘I ♥ Birds’ nest box making event which attracted approx 250 people.

Having Fiona in the team has enabled us to further build on the success of our archaeological activities. Working in partnership with Murray Cook, Council archaeologist, Fiona ran a number of very popular digs at the end of the year, attracting 100’s of volunteers to our sites.

In 2013 the Education Service initiated the ‘Teaching in Nature’ project and we have offered our support to all those schools involved. This project aims to give teachers the skills and confidence to make use of their local openspaces for educational activities.

We also helped Forth Valley College to deliver ‘Branching Out’ at Plean Country Park. Branching Out is an innovative development for adults who use mental health services in Scotland. Each client completes three hours of activities per week in a woodland setting over a 12-week period.

Volunteer and community action days

No Attendees Action Days 20 360 Corporate Volunteers 4 106 Total 24 466 Equivalent hours 2330 Throughout 2013 we continued to develop partnerships with a number of groups that have brought greater numbers and productivity to our action days.

Members of Mercat Cross Community Council and volunteers have worked closely with us to deliver improvements, manage habitats and unearth the archaeology on Gowanhill. They have also been instrumental in bringing in further funding to provide interpretation and woodland management expertise. While with the help of volunteers from Prudential and Scottish Water we ‘Freed the Trees’ of Plean Country Park, over 4000 of them, from their tree tubes.

As always the Friends of Plean Country Park have been an invaluable resource in the running of our biggest and most popular site. While Butterfly Conservation Scotland has brought funding, expertise and volunteers to enhance the Lowland Raised Bog at Wester Moss.

Volunteering with the Ranger Service A big thanks to everyone who has volunteered with us during 2013. In 2014 we will offer a reduced programme of events and activities due to our reduced staff. We will continue to provide volunteers with opportunities to develop their skills and gain experience of conservation work and will continue to provide our most popular activities.

Dam building @ Wester Moss Volunteers @ Gowanhill

I ♥ Birds in the City Centre Bark in the Park @ Plean Country Park

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LBAP delivery The Stirling Biodiversity Steering Group has not since June 2012 and there has been no further progress in the production of the Stirling Biodiversity Action Plan.

In September the third Forth Valley Wildlife & Landscape Forum was held at Larbert High School. Approximately 60 people attended the Forum with 22 stalls set out and 11 speakers.

The Forum is run through the Forth Naturalist & Historian (FNH) and has now been held in each of the 3 local authority areas covered by FNH. Consideration will now be given to where and when the 2014 forum will be held and the format that it should take.

Delivery of the Council’s biodiversity duty Stirling Council has continued its support of the ‘On the Verge’ campaign and has created a number of large wildflower areas. In spring 4000m2 was sown in a prominent location at Stirling Bridge. The site looked spectacular and attracted a lot of interest and compliments. Due to works by Network Rail part of the site was lost but it will be replaced and expanded in 2014 to create an even larger wildflower meadow.

The Council has a wider aspiration to change the management of a large number of areas from amenity grass to wildflower meadows. This could mean an area of wildflowers coming to your town or village.

We have also continued to increase the number of native fruit trees on our land. A further 70 heritage variety trees – apple, pear, plum, medlar, filbert and more were planted in Raploch, Bannockburn, Blairlogie and Beechwood Park.

Only around 121,000 red squirrels are left in Scotland today. Without sustained action, the red squirrel could become extinct on mainland Scotland. As part of the Saving Scotland’s Red Squirrels project we are taking action to monitor the distribution of the squirrelpox virus.

We continue to increase the ecological skills within the Ranger Service so that we are better able to provide expert advice to our colleagues. We are exploring closer working links with Scottish Badgers and are key supporters of the newly established CentARG (Central Scotland Amphibian & Reptile Group). Rangers have helped to deliver training and conducted surveys for nationally protected species in Stirling and neighbouring areas.

Pests and diseases and Biosecurity Many will know of historic pests and diseases that have affected our trees and woodlands including Dutch elm disease.

There are currently a number of threats to our native plants including Phytophthora lateralis which particularly affects Lawson cypress trees, Phytophthora ramorum also known as Sudden Oak Death and Chalara fraxinea which causes the dieback of our ash trees. Many of these pests and diseases are present on or near our sites. To minimise the potential for the spread of these diseases we are following biosecurity advice produced by the Forestry Commission. Details of the measures that should be taken can be found at:

http://www.forestry.gov.uk/forestry/INFD-8ZJMQ4

Above: Wildflowers @ Stirling Bridge

Above: The Raploch orchard Below: Phytophthora lateralis affected tree

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Site monitoring, maintenance and management The Ranger Service, and others in Land Services, are currently facing a number of issues with relation to the sites that we manage. There has been a recent spate of theft and vandalism to woods by people taking it upon themselves to go out and fell trees.

The motivation for such dangerous and illegal activity could be to provide fuel for wood burning stoves in homes, or to open up sunlight to residential property, but is still a crime!

We are putting together a press release to highlight the illegality of people's actions and hope that this might help. With chainsaws making such a noise and with some of these sites being very busy we really hope that members of the public who may have seen something suspicious will come forward and let us know.

Woodlands also require a certain amount of deadwood to keep the ecosystem healthy, so vandalising living trees and lifting lying wood can have a negative impact on plants, insects, birds and mammals.

Beyond tree felling we also have issues with people extending their gardens into our sites, dumping garden waste into our sites and removing fallen timber from our sites.

You will have seen at the start of this report that the staff within the Ranger Service and Countryside Team has been reduced. This has meant that we are no longer able to properly manage all the sites that we have been invloved with over the years. The first site where we will no longer have any involvement is Doune Ponds. It is a shame that we have had to say goodbye to this popular site (and its brilliant benches) but the land owners and the local community are looking into ways that they can continue to manage the site for recreation and biodiversity.

Accessing external funding

In 2013 funding was secured that allowed us to employ staff on one or two-year placements: Council for British Archaeology – Funding a Community Archaeology placement for one-year

based with the Rangers. Coastal Communities Fund – Clackmannanshire Council secured funding that enabled training

placements. Many are hosted by external organisations and Stirling Council has two – an apprentice ranger and fisheries apprentice.

Biological data – collection and management

The FNH ‘What’s Changed’ project looked to describe the ‘Changing Biodiversity of Central Scotland’. As part of this project, and with the help of a group of dedicated volunteers, we conducted a survey of invasive non-native species along the Allan Water and compared the results to a survey from 1984. The results showed the huge spread in invasives over the last 30 years. These results will be written up as a paper for publication in FNH’s annual Journal.

Access promotion

The third ‘Great Outdoors Festival’, run with the Ranger Services from East and West Dunbartonshire, attracted hundreds of walkers, riders and kayakers who enjoyed our area’s fantastic environment.

Unfortunately this will be the final GOF that we are able to participate in. We will instead focus our resources on the delivery of our annual events programme.

Giant hogweed @ Cornton

Above: Illegal damage to one of our trees Below: Bench @ Doune Ponds

Fly by Nights @ Kings Knot