WOOD LANE: wild, wet and wonderful

It was during the merrymaking of a Christmas party that John Hawkins first suggested his idea of creating a wetland bird reserve at Wood Lane to Bill Griffiths. The old worked out sand and gravel pits had recently been restored to farmland and John and other local birdwatchers had been excited by the appearance of the odd pair of nesting lapwing and flurries of migrating waders including relative rarities such as little ringed plover.

Bill thought it was a marvellous idea. The farmland hadn't been very productive - the ground was too wet, the very thing that made it attractive to wading birds. So the nature reserve was born and a partnership between local people and Tudor Griffiths Group formed that has since flourished and grown into an amazing success story.

It is just 10 years since the diggers first moved in, scooping out shallow lagoons and making islands. Sluices were installed so water levels could be raised or lowered. A glorious abundance of mud was now available and the birds flocked in. Little ringed plover settled down to breed in the first spring. Reeds were planted by local volunteers, providing places for nesting and sheltering. They grew and that secretive bird the water rail was soon spotted skulking among them.

Wood Lane's pools are now drawing birds scarcely seen in this part of Shropshire since the ancient bogs and mosses which once covered huge swathes of the area were drained and ploughed up. Greenshank, redshank, dunlin, whimbrel, green sandpiper and little stint are all now regular spring and autumn visitors, dropping by to delve and forage en route to and from their breeding grounds in northern Europe. Exotic visitors such as snow geese, little egret and even a spoonbill have dropped by.

Hundreds of lapwing, winter migrants from eastern and central Europe, come here to escape freezing conditions on the continent. In February last year a vast flock of 2000 birds was counted. The reserve is now one of the county's strongholds for breeding lapwing with four or five pairs nesting each year.

It isn't only wetland birds that have found refuge here. In April swallows and house martins descend on Wood Lane, skimming the water for insects, feeding up after their long journey from south Africa. Sand martins come to stay, burrowing into the sandy cliffs exposed by quarrying activity next to the reserve. Yellow-hammers, tree sparrows, meadow pipits and many commoner species thrive on the reserve. So far 168 species of bird have been recorded since 1999.

The life of the reserve is minutely recorded. More than 58,000 bird sightings have been logged in the hide record books in the last six years and all data is fed into the impressive Wood Lane website www.woodlanereserve.co.uk run by John Harding. This is a treasure house of information not just about the reserve's birds, but other wildlife too, local events and school visit reports. This ever-growing collection of data, fascinating in itself, is also an invaluable tool for making sure the management of the reserve is right.

The website also contains Stan Horton's delightful monthly reports of life on the reserve, chronicling everything from the appearance of the first cowslip, cuckoo or lacewing to the cleverness of two wood mice who worked out that if they climbed up some nettles and scurried along the branch of an alder tree they could reach the bird feeder and its tasty store of nuts!

Numerous people have been active in creating Wood Lane nature reserve. These include over a dozen local people who regularly help out with management tasks; Wildlife Trust volunteers who wove the osprey nests (still awaiting occupants) fixed to the electricity poles and the Ellesmere Branch who sowed a wildflower meadow. Recognition for this fantastic level of community involvement has been given by the BTO Hanson/Tarmac awards, won by Wood Lane three times in 2000, 2002 and 2004. Twice they have also won the bird numbers award.

"I've watched every stage that this bit of land has gone through from arable production to sand and gravel pits, back to arable and now this very special wetland," says Bill Griffiths. "We're all really proud of how it's turned out."

Sarah Bierley