Safeguarding
The developing wetland near the beach was very precarious and regularly adversely affected by storms and rain fall events causing the loss of the standing water and reed bed as well as the flooding/washing away of the South West Coast Path making it impassable.
These events are likely to become more regular over the coming years and with the potential for sea level rises, the South West Coast Path could be lost completely and the wetland become a salt marsh. This project was always likely to be very fluid due to the nature of the site and the next phase of the scheme was to look at safeguarding both the South West Coast Path and the fresh water wetland.
After a number of discussions with Natural England and the South West Coast Path Association it was felt that undertaking large scale flood defences and damming near the beach to protect the path and wetland would be against the aims of natural processes, unpractical and unviable due to the likelihood of continued storm and flooding damage.
The finished result
Work went ahead to create a new alternative route for the South West Coast Path further up the valley near the bird hide, and use this as an opportunity to create a new area of standing water and reed beds further from the beach.
This will develop and remain undisturbed from potential storm damage providing a more stable habitat for the flora and fauna using the site as well as creating conditions to encourage other species to colonise. We also did some new infrastructure work to ensure that appropriate grazing can be undertaken on the site to control vegetation on the site, and completed the project at the end of winter 2019
