Mersea Mersea me…
Our work takes us to some intriguing, wild and fascinating places, this week was no exception. An island only reached by crossing a salt marsh causeway that is often reclaimed by the sea on surge assisted spring tides. Mersea Island is on the southern Essex coast where the Blackwater and Colne estuaries empty at the meeting of the North Sea and the Strait of Dover, it's a part of the country we haven't visited before, so were very excited to see what wildlife we could find, whilst doing some research into a potential future project.
Rock Oyster, Crassostrea gigas
Cudmore Grove is a small area of meadow and woodland on the south east side of the island, the beach here is strewn with the shells of Pacific Rock Oysters and Slipper limpets, along with the somnolent ruins of trees, once proud sentries of the rust red cliffs. The air here is dominated by mud, salt and algae, saltmarsh has an aroma that nosedives me straight to my childhood wandering the shores of the Camel estuary, it holds, for me, within its bleak stink the same essence of uncanny excitement and anticipation, that waiting for the first fizzle of blue touch paper has on bonfire night. Instead of whistles and bangs, it's the peee-uu-ee of Grey Plovers and the kyip-kyip-kyip of Redshanks, and a vit!-vit! bouncing overhead, surely these are the last Swallows we will see this year.
Although the sliver of woodland remaining here is slowly being swallowed by the sea, there is hope for the future. The 'Essex Forest Initiative' plans to plant 375,000 trees over the next five years, covering 150 hectares of land, and there is one resident of Mersea island that completely took us by surprise, that will most definitely be needing more trees, the Red Squirrel.
Stopping dead in our tracks Trish could hardly get the words out, pointing at the empty leafy path. I didn't see it, but I could tell by the look on her face that she 'had' seen it, so we went scouring the woods for signs, and it wasn't long before the THUNK! from a falling pine cone pulled our gaze to the top of a Scots pine, a football sized drey (nest), and next to it a vivid fuzzy rusty red squirrel, casually perched on the swaying uppermost needles chewing pine seeds. We watched for as long as the cricks in our necks would allow, and left Mersea island on a real high, this is obviously a very special place that has managed to pull off the rare juggling act of keeping hold of a lot of its coastal and community traditions whilst also managing to look after its precious wildlife and habitats, we very much hope to return soon.