Virtual placement starts

Monday 14th December 2020

First day of the Hengistbury Head virtual placement. They have a great wildlife conservation work placement program created by the Head Ranger Brian. Its the first time they have had to do this virtually. It was a great start - we have been split into teams and will have a piece of work to complete on public engagement which we need to submit by the end of January. A good way of ensuring that we are all engaged during the virtual sessions!

Hengistbury Head is 164 hectares with about 1 million visitors as year. They only have 3 full time staff - the rest of the work needs to be done by volunteers or by getting funding from various places. Its amazing what they manage to do with that budget.

Again what came across very clearly is the need for public education and engagement - its really a cornerstone of the work that rangers do.

Word for today is BioBlitz. This is an event that focuses on finding and identifying as many species as possible in a specific area over a short period of time - usually 24 hours. At a BioBlitz, scientists, families, students, teachers, and other community members work together to get a snapshot of an area’s biodiversity. Its a great way of collecting data and also engaging the local community to help them understand what is going on in nature near to them.