December News

November continued to be a busy month with a number of Friends of Nevis events taking place following on from the AGM at the start of the month. Dougie led an accredited Footpath Awareness day on the 14th of November which was attended by our new trio of Trainee Volunteer Rangers, some local Mountain Leaders, Nevis Partnership's Fundraising Manager and her partner. The walk up the Allt a Mhuillin path took place in excellent weather to see drains and ditches working (i.e. lashing down with rain!!) Some of the discussion on the day also looked at ways of informing walkers about the work done on  paths and funded by donations in the cairns.

The Autumn litter pick and curling ponds clear up on the 18th was very well attended with 33 volunteers turning up on the day. Calum Ross kindly organised a chipper to reduce some of the piles of brash left over from thinning out vegetation regrowth at the curling ponds.  The day was also an opportunity for three brand new TVR's (Eilidh, Jen and Cormac) to meet Friends of Nevis in person. They were duly detailed to the river banks and cleared up a mass of litter upstream of Nevis Bridge. The Ben Nevis Highland Centre hosted the coffee / shortbread briefing in the morning. FoN really appreciates their support, since FoN began the Litter Picks 10 years ago.
As always great organisation and preparation from Joy, Fiona Wild and Hughie, thanks also to Paul Biggin for his help collecting bags of rubbish at the end of the day and taking it to recycling.

BTO licenced bird ringer John Owen continues to run drop in ringing events at the Visitor Centre aided by FoN trainee ringer Kirstie and Skye based trainee ringer Jonathon. On Sunday 25th November  they had 178 captures, 139 new and 39 retraps (numbers in brackets, birds that had been previously ringed on other occasions) The birds ringed  included Coat tits 24 (16), Blue tits 28 (8), Great tits 26 (7), Chaffinch 36, Robin 8 (3), Black birds 6, Long tailed tits 3 (1), Dunnock 1 (1), Great Spotted Woodpecker (1), Siskin 5, Goldfinch 2 (1), Treecreeper (1).

December Dates for Your Diary

• Footpath Work Party 5th December
• Festive Felling 8th December
• Drop in Christmas Fair at Visitor Centre 9th December

Details for all of these events can be found by going to the events page