Storm Ciarán — Damage Assessment & Wildlife Checks 🌳🦇
When Storm Ciarán swept through Jersey in early November 2023, our team were quickly on the ground assessing the damage and checking for any wildlife that may have been impacted.
Our first priority was Grouville Marsh and Grouville Common, where we carried out an initial damage assessment. While the main marsh and the lower common near the football pitch escaped significant damage, the same could not be said for the Liberation Field and hay meadow, where a significant number of trees had come down. Sadly, the initial inspection also made clear that the clean-up process itself would result in further losses, with a number of still-standing trees dislodged or poorly weighted. The trees lost ranged in age from approximately 25 to 90 years old.
We also supported Jersey Trees for Life at Val de la Mare Arboretum, where our team helped assess damage and — crucially — identify and check bat roosts in fallen and damaged trees. This kind of rapid protected species assessment in the aftermath of storm events is a vital but often overlooked part of the recovery process, ensuring that wildlife considerations are built into clearance work from the outset.
The clearance work that followed was a real team effort. Alongside volunteers and Jersey Water, the team got to work on site — and one moment stood out in particular: careful checks were carried out on a fallen elm that had come down across one of only 40 wild Cuban juniper specimens known to exist. It was a tense moment, but one with a happy outcome.
As ever, it was a reminder of how quickly our natural environment can be affected by extreme weather — and why having ecologists on hand in the immediate aftermath matters so much.
