Canterbury Golf Club is supporting the reintroduction of choughs to Kent as a part of the wildlife conservation work that’s already being undertaken by the membership over its 160 acres of land, together with the golf course.
Located on the outskirts of Kent’s medieval cathedral metropolis, the membership made the choice earlier this yr to assist sponsor a GPS monitoring programme which is a part of a pioneering reintroduction mission being run collectively by the Wildwood Trust and Kent Wildlife Trust.
Involvement on this mission is a pure match for the membership, given its lengthy affiliation with the chough.
“To support this cause is an obvious choice for us as this iconic bird has been featured on the club’s crest since its establishment in 1927,” explains Roger Hyder, General Manager of Canterbury Golf Club, which is home to a basic Harry Colt structure.
“Hence we are delighted to be supporting this ground-breaking project especially as it complements the wildlife conservation work we have been doing, and will continue to do, on our own land. We really hope that other local businesses will follow our example and help to support it too.”
In early January a go to to Wildwood in Herne was organised by the Club’s biodiversity specialist, Anthony Dance, to allow members of the Golf Club to be taught extra in regards to the worthwhile work that the membership helps to fund.
There, for instance, they realized that GPS tags are hooked up to the choughs at their launch website near the cliffs of Dover to allow the group coordinating the mission to trace the actions of the birds and discover out the place they select to feed. This offers crucial details about the areas of chalk downland that are most favoured by choughs and the methods that are simplest for managing these areas.
Red-billed choughs have been lacking from Kent for over 200 years resulting from habitat loss and persecution, however fortunately this hanging species is now being introduced again to the cliffs of Dover.
The chough re-introduction mission is a collaboration between the Wildwood Trust, Kent Wildlife Trust, the National Trust, English Heritage, the White Cliffs Countryside Partnership and native farmers and landowners and now, Canterbury Golf Club.
It is now beginning its second yr and can run for a five-year interval, introducing eight to 10 choughs to the cliffs of Dover every year. It is hoped that the mission will present the catalyst for a sequence of reintroduction tasks alongside the south coast which is able to hyperlink Kent’s embryonic chough inhabitants with England’s final important inhabitants situated in Cornwall, within the far southwest of the nation.
