Giving Nature a Hand
Saltmarshes provide important wetland habitats for a range of organisms, in particular specialist plant communities and associated animals, and they are therefore of high conservation interest. They act as high tide refuges for wading birds and wildfowl that feed on adjacent mudflats, support breeding waders, gulls and terns, and are a source of food for passerines, particularly in autumn and winter.
However, saltmarsh is a relatively rare habitat in Northern Ireland with an estimate of its total extent here being a mere 250 hectares. This equates to only around 0.5% of the total UK saltmarsh (45,500 hectares). Part of WWT Castle Espie’s contribution to the Northern Ireland total is our Wadermarsh.
During the redevelopment in 2008/9, we tried to give nature a helping hand by creating the physical conditions that favour saltmarsh – creating islands that would encourage the establishment of saltmarsh plant communities, improving water level control via a new sluice etc. However, when working with nature, there are no certainties, and it became clear that the potential of the burgeoning saltmarsh habitat could be significantly improved by doing further work on it. To that end three of the Wadermarsh islands were reprofiled during the summer, thus ensuring that they would be totally covered at high tide. In addition, work was done to control the growth of vegetation on the shingle loafing bank to enhance its attractiveness for ground nesting species such as terns and Ringed Plover, while reducing the need for regular manual weeding by grounds staff. Now the work is finished…we wait!
Funding for this work was obtained from the Aughrim Landfill Programme, via Groundwork NI (administrator of
Aughrim Landfill Tax Credits), as an approved project under the Landill Tax Regulations 1996, and from global
law firm Eversheds Sutherland as part of their corporate responsibility programme.
