The new project is expected to protect homes and provide a new home for birds
Hannah Phillips, Nature Recovery Programme Manager for Cheshire Wildlife Trust, at the site of proposed new wetland near Hoylake(Image: Andrew Teebay Liverpool Echo)
Work will start on creating a large wetlands between two Merseyside towns later this year. It is hoped the “one of a kind” project could be the first of many across the region.
The wetlands would be created across the Hoylake Carrs between West Kirby and Hoylake. The Birket, a tributary of the River Mersey, runs through the site with the land acting as a floodplain at times.
The scheme has been in development for a number of years with funding announced for the project following a bid by Wirral Council and the Cheshire Wildlife Trust. There are no plans to create a wetland centre, though flocks of birds may bring photographers and visitors to the area.
Taking the ECHO on a tour of the site, Hannah Phillips, the Cheshire Wildlife Trust’s Nature Recovery Programme Manager, said: “We are waiting for one final permit from the Environment Agency. That is one final piece of the puzzle to slot in.
“We have got contractors lined up so delivery is expected end of the summer between July and September. It gives us decent ground conditions because it obviously gets completely wet over the winter.”
The ground is already waterlogged over the winter(Image: Andrew Teebay Liverpool Echo)
When work starts, people will see scrapes or shallow ponds dug out of the earth as well as some leaky dams installed over the course of a month. These will slow the amount of water draining off the land and into the Birket.
Close to the Dee Estuary, the wetland would create areas where birds can breed or seek shelter at high tide or during storms. People will be able to view the wetland from a number of footpaths in the area around the site.
The land was used for farming but despite work to drain the land, the area is waterlogged over the winter. However as part of the wetland management, animals will be used to graze the land and stop it becoming overgrown.
Plans that have been put forward for the wetland(Image: Cheshire Wildlife Trust/JBA Consulting)
Ms Phillips said: “It’s a big project for Wirral and a big project for The Cheshire Wildlife Trust. We have done a lot of wetland habitat creation but on this scale is something quite new to us.”
She said the site had huge potential, adding: “There are no plans to put any infrastructure in as part of this project. This is just about creating those wetland features.
“There may be future phases. We are looking at the future of the site and how we manage it and what else we might like to add to it in time. In terms of the work this year, nothing significant will change in terms of access.”
The wetland was described as being one of a kind(Image: Andrew Teebay Liverpool Echo)
She added: “There’s nothing on this scale. I hope it is not one of a kind for long because we want to see sites like this everywhere. I see it as a demonstration of what can be achieved and how fantastic it can be.”
When the plans were first introduced, there were concerns the project could create more risk of flooding. While Ms Phillips said this was an understandable concern, she said they were not adding water to the site or creating large reservoirs to hold water back.
She said: “A wetland like this should naturally dry out in the summer. That is a normal process”, adding: “What we are looking to do is trying to encourage water to stay longer on site throughout the year in small pockets which is really beneficial for those waders.”
Comparing it to turning the water down with a tap, she said: “The longer water sits at the upstream end of a river and the more slowly it makes its way back into the river, it means we’re not seeing a huge gush in terms of the volume of water heading downstream.”