The Official #SLWF Launch!

Saturday 26th September 2015 10:00 – 18:00. Willow Tree Fen Nature Reserve, off Counter Drain Drove, Spalding, Lincolnshire PE11 3JH. Between Bourne and Spalding, south of the River Glen, the entrance is over a small bridge opposite Bank House Farm on Counter Drain Drove between Pode Hole and Tongue End.

Although the festival starts the day before on the 25th, we’re delighted to be holding our official launch at Willow Tree Fen Nature Reserve courtesy of Lincolnshire Wildlife Trust.

Willow Tree Fen is the largest area of wild fenland in Lincolnshire and over the last five years has undergone a transformation from arable land where beans and cereal were grown to a more traditional landscape of shallow meres, seasonally flooded pastures, hay meadows and reedbeds where wildlife now thrives. In January 2010, over 120 visitors helped Heritage Lincolnshire carry out a geophysical survey, field-walk the site, auger test deposits and dig test pits. Four trenches were dug crossing the site of a Roman drainage ditch. The fieldwalking yielded two new Iron Age/Roman saltmaking sites and a selection of Roman domestic pottery. You’ll also have the chance to find out what’s happening in the local area, so make a day of it!

The launch event is perfect for the whole family and will include several guided walks around the site (including a bat walk at 18:00!), crafts, den building, mini beast hunts, Nature Detectives, pond dipping and dissection of owl pellets