We've been examining the historic rainfall records held by the Met Office for the monitoring station at Manston, and it has certainly been an unusual month - a mere 15.6mm (0.6") of rain, compared to last January when we had 90.5mm (3.6"). In fact this was the driest January for 22 years!

So what does this mean for the woods? We are sometimes asked where our water supply is, and we point at the clouds…. so a lack of rain can be an issue for our young trees.

However we counter this by planting saplings (generally no taller than 1.5m), which need less water to establish. Thanks to our homemade mulch mats and woodchip, precious moisture is retained; and by removing competing vegetation around the planting area, our young trees can maximise the benefits of all available rainfall and sunlight ?

These methods appear to be working in terms of the survival rates, but that won't stop us doing a rain dance!

• to guide our work over the next few years
• to summarise our progress to date
• to describe habitats and the wildlife found within
• to set out our ethos, what we want to achieve and why
• to supply land management information to the landowner (TDC)
• to support future funding applications
• to summarise all the above in an easy to read format

The plan is not intended to be static, and the success or otherwise of the various objectives will be reviewed, as we adjust to community feedback and the ever changing site conditions. The main headlines are as follows:-

✅ smaller scale tree planting, with a greater emphasis on tree maintenance
✅ glades and open areas for people and wildlife
✅ habitat interventions such as reptile refuges, dry hedges and bird boxes
✅ control of invasive species
✅ extending the path network in the woods
✅ public engagement events and site interpretation
✅ investigating an upgrade in designation to a Local Wildlife Site

Click on the links below to read the full Land Management Plan and the associated Work Plan.

We will be returning each month to help these new trees to grow, and willing volunteers are always welcomed to come along and help - find out more here on our volunteer page.

On the 2^nd and 3^rd September, I visited the woods again to see which butterflies would still be around.  There were lots of Small Whites, several Large Whites, two each of Common Blue and Small Copper, and one each of Red Admiral, Speckled Wood, Comma and Brown Argus.  The Brown Argus was in exactly the same place as my observation of one last year.  This is encouraging, because it probably shows that they are breeding here, and they are known not to wander far from their colonies.   The female of the Common Blue is brown and can look very like a Brown Argus, but can be distinguished by differences in the spots on the underside, especially an extra spot on the forewing.  You can see that some of the butterflies are quite worn and ragged after a busy summer dashing about amongst the grass.

Malcolm also sent photos along with captions, to help identify certain butterfly species, check them out below!

We were contacted again by Malcolm Watling, who sent us in a butterfly survey here, from last year. This year he said:

'The weather hasn’t been very butterfly friendly during my visits to Margate this year, but the 3^rd July had some useful sunny intervals when I visited the site.  There weren’t many butterflies, but that was partly because this time of year is between the spring and summer broods of some species.  However, the Marbled Whites and Meadow Browns had recently begun to appear, and there were quite a few of them around, despite the rather cool wind.  I saw several Small Whites, some Holly Blues, a couple of Small Skippers and one each of Large Skipper, Painted Lady, Red Admiral, Burnet moth and the pale, summer form of the Comma.  A botanical bonus was a Pyramidal Orchid in the Oxeye Daisy area patch.'

Such a beautiful photo from the eagle-eyed Malcolm!

Elsewhere in the woods, we have spotted 10 lizards in just a 20 minute stretch, including yet anther rare colour variation of the common lizard, which can be spotted in the middle in the photo below.

But as Kashmir explained to the attentive Cubs, waste is a problem that we have created, therefore it is a problem that we can solve! Using the waste hierarchy, we can reduce, reuse and recycle, often in fun and creative ways.

Waste is an issue closely tied with Dane Valley Woods, from both its past and present. Dane Valley Woods was an old landfill site, as a result, we often find odd items when digging around! Whilst this is great because it is now covered in emerging woodlands, we care about the environment and do not want to see all our natural spaces being covered in landfill sites. Waste is also a present problem for us, as the site is a main route through Dane Valley, therefore we are constantly battling with litter. We spend many task days litter-picking, which consumes voluntary time and effort.

The Cubs kindly helped us by using their time to litter-pick at the woodlands and giving us a kind donation, to which we are incredibly grateful.

Thanks to everyone voting in Tesco stores, we have been awarded the first prize of £12,000 in the Tesco Bags of Help scheme!

The team are all over the moon, and we'd like to thank everyone who voted, spread the word and showed their support for us!

Tesco has teamed up with Groundwork to launch its Bags of Help initiative across England and Wales. The scheme will see three community groups and projects awarded grants of £12,000, £10,000 and £8,000 – all raised from the 5p bag charge. Bags of Help offers community groups and projects in each of Tesco’s 390 regions across the UK a share of revenue generated from the five pence charge levied on single-use carrier bags.

Dane Valley Woods has been shortlisted in the Thanet region, and the public will now vote in store from 27 February until 6 March on who should receive the £12,000, £10,000 and £8,000 awards.

"On the 28th and 29th July I spent a couple of hours on each day looking round the site for butterflies and other wildlife. The weather was a bit breezy and cloudy, but warm with enough useful sunny intervals. Here is a list of my observations:

- Large White and Gatekeeper, very common
- Small White and Meadow brown, frequent
- Oak Eggar Moth (1) (by the Mill)
- Speckled Wood (1)
- Migrant Hawker dragonfly (2)
- Brown Argus, (1)
- Common Blue male, several
- Common Blue female (1) (with a lot of blue colour)
- Essex Skipper (4)
- Holly Blue (3)
- Red Admiral (1)
- Peacock (1)
- 6-Spotted Burnet moth (1)

There was also one Common Lizard, basking on a crumpled-up black bin-liner!"

Brown Argus (female) 29 July 2015

Malcolm has also sent a picture of the Woods site from 1973, showing what is presumed to be the former tip site, with loads of starlings on a bush. He notes that the size of the trees along the road is worth comparing with now, as is the style of the cars. Thank you Malcolm for sending this information in, we look forward to hearing from you again, and we would also like to hear from anyone else who has memories like this or are recording wildlife - let us know via the contact page on this website.

Dane Valley Woods on 2 June 1973