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Life returns to a wasteland of war

‘Three o’clock’, just inside the M25 orbital, is an unlikely place to go bird watching, but nestled on the north bank of the Thames, bordered by flyovers and pylons, is a new nature reserve, an oasis of calm amidst sleepy suburban sprawl. Daily Telegraph, 13th January

What was a Ministry of Defence shooting range until the late 1990s, and a place to dump silt from the river, is now an 870acre wetland grazing area for birds and other wildlife. “It’s ideal,” says Paul Outhwaite, of the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds. “For years nobody did anything here except keep the grass down and fire on it.”

Around us, lorries creep along the motorway, tugs bob up the river and aircraft fly overhead. Above the Ford plant at Dagenham, two vast 85metre high wind turbines rotate to a gentle silent rhythm.

“People coming here don’t need to know what the birds are,” says Outhwaite, enthusiastically. “With Canary Wharf visible in one direction, and the Dartford Crossing in the other, they can just sit here and say ‘Gosh!’”

For more than a decade campaigners fought off a plethora of proposals to turn Rainham Marshes, in Purfleet, Essex, a Site of Special Scientific Interest, into a Disney Park, or more box-like buildings on yet another industrial estate. What eventually won the argument, says their champion, Phil Butler, from Havering Wildlife Trust, was the idea that the land was worth more if left alone than built on. A nature reserve would help create a better place to live and work, and serve as an attraction to inward investors.

Now that the bullets and shells have been removed, the six-year clean-up operation is complete, but the firing range butts, spotters’ sheds and relics of munitions stores have been retained as reminders of the scrubland’s former use. Meandering through teasels and bulrushes a trail takes in the three different ‘discovery zone’ habitats – woodland, marshland and reedbeds. As well as the birds, the 30miles of ditches are said to house 10% of the UK population of water voles.

“A lot of the construction work was done by volunteers,” says Outhwaite proudly, as we test out the walkway’s strength. “The RSPB has five of them to every member of staff.”

Freight containers have been converted into toilets and a café, and another provides a camouflaged hide. Part of the RSPB’s recycling policy? Not really, explains Outhwaite. The containers are practical - they can be moved if needed - and “fit in with the landscape and its transient, transport theme.”

Inside the hide, fixed to his binoculars, is Robert Burgess, from Uppminster, who has visited the reserve nearly every day since it opened; this morning he picked out a Peregrine Falcon and Merlin. “It’s brilliant, by far the best place for bird watching around here.“ Equally impressed are two GPs from North London, who are scouring the marshland’s snake-like ponds. The day’s weather forecast put them off playing golf, and their visit has been rewarded with hundreds of screeching lapwing.
Schoolchildren are the most obvious visitors, and, with pontoons for pond dipping and other outdoor classroom activities, 10,000 came in the three years before the reserve officially opened in November 2006.

Even if you can’t manage the 2.5-mile circuit Rainham is worth a visit. The views are best from the Environment and Education Centre at the entrance, which has won acclaim for its sustainability. With its multi-coloured wooden slats it could pass as a trendy café, or art gallery, but inside there are free-to-use binoculars and a list of the day’s rare sitings to encourage you: “Marsh Harrier, Heron, Kestrel and Stonechat.”

“We’re only 12 miles from Tower Bridge,” says Outhwaite. “Sometimes I have to pinch myself to remember where I am.”

www.rspb.org.uk/rainham


© Robert Bullard. Not for reproduction without prior permission

 

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