Every year, Odiham Parish Council contributes £1,500 towards the upkeep of Odiham and Broad Oak Commons.
Please find below a report from Hart Countryside Team which updates residents on the work carried out over the last year.
“This year at Odiham Common, we were excited to plant 50 disease-resistant Elms in the South West pastures to supplement failing existing habitat for White-letter hairstreak butterflies, which will be monitored for their success going forwards.
It was a good year for volunteering. We held 10 volunteer tasks, including hemlock water dropwort removal, scrub removal and elm planting and had 2 corporate groups come to volunteer.
Large winter works included veteran tree haloing across the site, a third of the wayleave scrub was cleared to promote natural grassland regeneration, scrub removal in woodland glades, some rotational coppicing and ash die-back works, removing diseased trees in high-risk areas such as road edges and property boundaries.
The woodland rides were also cut and collected at the end of the summer.
One exciting project was the addition of 2 new ponds, dug in partnership with the Newt Conservation Trust. These have been a great success. They will be surveyed again in March, but Great Crested Newts have already been found in one of the ponds.
Some ecological surveying has also taken place across the site. This includes dormouse and small mammal surveying, (where pygmy shrews and wood mice were found), butterfly transects, mapping of non-native plants for targeted removal, some reptile and amphibian surveys in partnership with HIWARG (Hampshire & Isle of Wight Amphibian & Reptile Group) and Rapid Habitat Assessments of the flora.
We also ran a bat walk for the public which was fully booked with 20 people attending.
We will also be doing some boardwalk replacements this spring.
At Broadoak Common we did the annual hay meadow cuts in the summer, as well as a Rapid Habitat Assessment of the flora. We replaced the access culvert with a wider bridge to allow our hay making equipment to access the site. We will also be replacing some rotten dragons’ teeth in the spring.
We trust that your parishioners will continue to enjoy their walking and riding on both Commons, and we will continue to try and enhance the biodiversity value of both sites.”