Above: Chiltern Society volunteers install a bird box
For the second year running, the Impress the Chess group and the Chiltern Society have teamed up to celebrate National Bird Box Week (14 to 21 February). Impress the Chess runs a sponsored bird box scheme to give nature-loving residents the chance to provide homes for small birds. This year, Chiltern Society volunteers have installed the sponsored boxes in Wright's Meadow along Water Lane (between Wey Lane and Germain Street).
The boxes will be monitored by the Chiltern Society as the bird breeding season progresses, to see if these blue tit boxes are being used. Bird box sponsors will be invited along to monitoring sessions.
This project was initiated by the Impress the Chess group as part of a series of improvements to habitats along the River Chess. Impress the Chess is a Town Council-led partnership of local authorities, conservation bodies and community groups that works to protect and restore the River Chess in Chesham. The partnership has created an Action Plan to help conserve this rare chalk stream environment and is actively working with landowners and volunteers on schemes like this.
Above: One of the blue tit boxes in situ
Impress the Chess is very grateful to the Chiltern Society for its bird box expertise and manpower, having already put up a number of boxes in Meades Water Gardens last year, many of which were nested in and had young birds successfully fledge. The Chiltern Society is the only charity dedicated to conserving the whole of the Chilterns landscape, with the support of 7,000 members. Having been in existence for more than 50 years, the Chiltern Society has a strong team of 500 volunteers who not only work on their own reserves, but also help to conserve local authority sites, such as Captains Wood.
Above: a successfully fledged tit nest cleared out from a bird box in Meades Water Gardens at the end of the 2017 breeding season
Published: 27 February 2018