The Stanley 3 Woods Nature Walk
West Stormont Connections
Join your fellow walkers to discover the local path networks and enjoy the natural history of the West Stormont Connect area, there are 195 square kilometres out there to explore, but not all at once.
West Stormont is a scenic area containing two important conservation woodland areas, Taymount Wood and Five Mile Wood, several villages and hamlets, huge areas of farmland, and the River Tay. The existing connections for people on footpath networks and for nature on nature corridors are desperately in need of improvements and habitat enhancements for the area to thrive, and make a positive contribution towards the effects of climate change.
The idea of achieving a Stanley Biodiversity Village award requires a joint effort from all the communities, together with organisations including West Stormont Woodland Group, Tayside Biodiversity Partnership, Perth and Kinross Countryside Trust, Nature Connections Partnership-Perth & Kinross, Stanley Development Trust, Perth & Kinross Climate Action, Tayside Woodland Partnerships, to name but a few. See their websites for more information.
See the West Stormont Woodland Group website to see how you, as an individual, can help and make vital differences that will improve your wellbeing, and the future good of our natural world.
Mike Thewlis
What has WSWG been doing these past few months?
There has been so much direct mailing to our members and supporters of notices for events, our AGM admin, appeals for new members of the WSWG board and new committee, that this is our first monthly update since April! So hello again to everyone and apologies for the gap!
Clearly a major activity of late has been the work Mike Thewlis has been putting in to reconnecting us all with our local access network within and between the woods and flagging up the importance of using it or losing it, and of taking action to look after both it and all the associated habitat corridors for people and wildlife. On 28 May, a group of people from the Airntully area joined Mike on a loop walk between Airntully and Five Mile Wood, where seasonal conditions can make access really difficult. On 21 July, a small group of WSWG members braved the drenching weather forecast to complete the 6km Green Route walk from Taymount Wood car park along the Ballathie old railway route, following the core path up to the east end of Taymount Wood and back through the woods to the car park. In the event, whilst it was very wet underfoot and in places where soaking vegetation was knee high, it was perfectly lovely weather for walking otherwise. And what a wonderful abundance of wild flowers along the old railway walk at this time of year as well as the forest track verges in Taymount Wood. But Lesson 1 – consider preferences for fast and slow pace when a mixed group! Click here for details of a 10km walk you can join on 3 August from Taymount Wood to Five Mile Wood. We would like to organise more walks to suit different people’s availability, so please let us know if there’s a particular route you’d like us to choose and whether a weekday, weekend or evening would be good. And so a huge thank you to Mike for opening up all these opportunities for us.
Our AGM on 7 June was very enjoyable, particularly the enthusiastic socialising and discussions we had over tea and cake after the formal proceedings, so thank you to everyone who came along to support the WSWG project there. However, as sadly for us Peter Hemmings resigned as a trustee at the AGM due to moving away from the area and with no nominations at the AGM for new trustees, our board is currently smaller than we need it to be. A project like WSWG depends on new people coming forward to secure what is called “planned succession” to make sure it can carry on long term, so we are open to any member getting in touch who might be willing to become a trustee this year or maybe even next year. One or two WSWG members have indicated they are keen to help at the heart of the project in other ways, so if we could swell those numbers a bit more to form a back-up group to proactively help the trustees (like Mike has) with the more fun, engagement activities (eg planning the events programme, social media, involving young people, mini-bus driving, creating our rolling photographic resource, nature recording, and any creative ways people would like to get involved) that would be really brilliant. We are still doing lots though, despite our current recruitment needs – so read on and enjoy these stories and perhaps be inspired to lend a hand in shaping and delivering the way forward.
Jan Hendry’s mothy activity in Taymount Wood as part of her Scotland-wide “Fragile” Art and Ecology Project has been totally fascinating, thoroughly inspiring and provided further insight into the wonderful biodiversity in our woods with an amazing array of glorious moths. Again supporting our view that the future of these woods can and must play its best possible role in local nature recovery going forward. WSWG will be mailing out a Blog from Jan soon where you can read more about how “Fragile” came about and what she has achieved and discovered through it.
And next month, Jan is delivering a Magic Moths Art and Ecology Workshop in Stanley Village Hall. More details below.
WSWG has played a key role in the Stanley Biodiversity Village Project over recent months and will continue to do so. Stanley is one of 16 towns, villages and neighbourhoods in Perth and Kinross participating in this Tayside Biodiversity Partnership initiative. It has resourced a large number of wildlife activities in Stanley this year for hedgehogs, pollinators, swifts, swallows and housemartins, bats, amphibians and more, and there is so much more wonderful stuff we can do. On 3 May we had a joint WSWG Stanley Biodiversity Village table at the Stanley Community Connections event. In June and July, we promoted and participated in a programme of events for the Stanley Biodiversity Village Mini-Bioblitz comprising a hedgehog event, PoMS FIT Count training, a swift walk with Perthshire Wildlife, a Biodiversity Towns, Villages and Neighbourhoods StoryMap demonstration, Moth Survey and Nature Walk in Taymount Wood, plus a bat walk and bat detector training session with Jean Oudney. Again, Stanley Biodiversity Village is a community project which is looking to convene a small group of interested people as soon as possible to plan, co-ordinate and communicate how the project goes forward. If anyone would like to be part of that exciting opportunity or knows someone who would, please do get in touch with WSWG in the first instance.
On 29 May, we had our first woodland walk of 2025 with our friends from Vision PK. Our wonderful WSWG volunteers came along to buddy anyone with visual impairment who needed a friendly arm or voice to guide them. After a lovely walk in Taymount Wood, having foreseen rain stopping play, we had shifted the picnic lunch (prepared for us by Alison’s Kitchen) to Stanley Village Hall where we also chatted about the Climate Café movement and how this now global network started in 2015 in Dunkeld and Birnam.
On 14 June, we had our first Biscuit day of the year with Wee Adventures for two children’s bushcraft sessions in the Taymount Wood. A soggy morning did nothing whatsoever to dampen the spirits of the little ones who tied knots, built tarp shelters, discovered the joys of the new mag posts from the Stanley Biodiversity Village Project, had juice and biscuits, then walked on slack lines, swung on rope swings, and peered at more forest treasures using the mag posts.
The weather cleared up a bit for the older children in the afternoon, when more knots, tarps, slack lines were strung out between the trees
On 18 June, we had our second walk of the year in Taymount Wood with Vision PK, this time the beautiful weather allowing us to have our picnic in the woods. During the walk we contributed to the Stanley Biodiversity Village Mini-Bioblitz by using the Merlin app to find out what birds could be heard, surveying and adding new species to WSWG’s rolling list of wildflowers found in Taymount Wood and a discussion about the new Climate Connect Perth and Kinross.
On the administrative side of things, having decided to upgrade the Expression of Interest approved by the National Lottery Heritage Fund (NLHF) in 2024, we were disappointed when our revised EOI submitted in March 2025 did not result in WSWG being invited to submit a Phase 1 Development Funding Application as hoped. However, we are currently liaising with NLHF over the form of a possible resubmission and will keep you posted.
And finally, on 20 July, the Board of Trustees submitted WSWG’s Objection to the planning application for an intensive breeding poultry unit at Newbigging Farm, situated a very short distance from the southern edge of Taymount Wood, accompanied by a list of 63 WSWG members and supporters local to the proposed development who wished their names to be added to WSWG’s Objection. We believe WSWG’s Objection was one of 56 overall alongside 5 in Support of the planning application. We will keep you posted on how things progress.
Tree Wardens
It is hoped every Biodiversity Village, Town and Neighbourhood will ultimately have at least one, preferably two volunteer Tree Wardens. There is no specific criteria to become a member: just an enthusiasm for trees! Training is given but no previous knowledge is expected at the outset. More information is available here.
If anyone might be interested in becoming a Tree Warden for Stanley, the following event might be of interest to you:
Scotland Regional Tree Warden Forum Meeting
SATURDAY 06 September 2025
9.30AM-4.30PM
Tickets: £10 per person
Book by clicking HERE where you will find a detailed programme for the event and further information.
They kindly ask that you book no later than midday on Friday 29th August, thank you.
Please also note that help may be available to cover the ticket price if needed and that there may be car sharing opportunities to help get to Dunfermline. If either of these things are appropriate please contact Charlie Knowles
Word of the Month
FIT Count: Flower Insect Timed Count. This is a simple Citizen Science survey run by the UK Pollinator Monitoring Scheme (PoMS) to collect data on the total number of insects that visit a particular flower, ideally chosen from the PoMS list of 14 target flowers. FIT Counts can be done anywhere, including gardens and parks, in warm, dry weather during daylight hours from 1 April to 30 September. Why not spend ten minutes watching flowers and insects in good weather and join in? For more information go to: www.ukpoms.org.uk/fit-counts
What’s coming up next?
Sunday 3 August: Discover Your Community Walks with Mike: Walk 2 – Red Route 10km, meet initially at 10.30am at Stanley school car park to co-ordinate cars for a starting time from Taymount Wood car park at 11am and an estimated finish time at Five Mile Wood car park about 3.30pm. Dress for the weather and bring a packed lunch. And let us know if you plan to come so we have an idea of numbers.
Saturday 9 August: “Magic Moths” Art and Ecology Workshop with Jan Hendry, 2-4pm in Stanley Village Hall. Suitable for anyone over 8 years old; under 16s to be accompanied by a responsible adult; only ten places available so booking essential. Read Jan’s BLOG here.
Monday 11 August: Bushcraft with Biscuit in Taymount Wood. But this time with a difference. Morning session for children. Afternoon session for grown-ups! This is the first time we’ve done woodland activities for adults with Wee Adventures, but as one of the mums at our recent children’s bushcraft event was overheard saying how great it would be to have something like this for adults and most of the dads also loving the challenge of the slack line, we thought why not. So here’s hoping we have good take-up of the places available. Some places are being reserved for Vision PK who are thrilled to be trying out something new for them too with Wee Adventures.
For more details on all of these upcoming events follow this link and for any questions you want to ask, please email contact@weststormontwoodlandgroup.scot
