The Annual General Meeting of Fleet Pond Society will take place at 7.15pm on Saturday 20th February 2010 at the St. Philip & St James Church Hall, Kings Road, Fleet.

We would like to encourage Members to attend, as this is your opportunity to put questions to the Executive Committee and to share your views on the future of Fleet Pond Nature Reserve.

Following the official business of the AGM, there will be a short break for refreshments, before we announce the winners of the Photographic Competition 2009. We do hope that every one who has entered will come along to see their photographs on display.

All members of the public are welcome to attend although only Members have voting rights.

Colin Gray writes:

Our 14 Feb task will be on the Dry Heath tackling more birch.  We achieved a lot at the December task but there is more we can tackle.  Andy Golder is bringing along his team of Wildlife Explorers complete with assistants and parents so we could be a sizeable team, unless some of you have other things in mind for Valentine’s Day?

Further details on the volunteer event schedule and meeting details can be found here.

Fleet Pond Society Chairman, Colin Gray, presents Mr Chowdhury with a certificate of appreciation.

An enjoyable evening was had by all at Fleet’s Gulshan Restaurant on 19^th January at Curry For Carnival Bridge Night!

The Gulshan’s Mr Chowdhury laid on a terrific meal, which was enjoyed by an assortment of guests, including members of the Fleet Pond Society and their friends, Fleet Lions and chums, plus staff from Hart Voluntary Action and the Environment Agency.

The event was not only a great night out; it also raised £448.00 for the Carnival Bridge fund.

The pond’s Carnival Bridge is in urgent need of replacing and the Society hopes to raise enough money through fund-raising and grants to buy a new one.

Fleet Pond Society would like to thank Mr Chowdhury and his staff for looking after everyone so well and keeping us topped up with food!

The Harper Asprey Wildlife Centre, Camberley, released three cygnets at Fleet Pond on Tuesday 2 February.

Photo credits: Geoff Dee and Martyn Aubrey.

Taking photographs at Fleet Pond is a very popular activity for a wide range of people. Doing a search in Google yields numerous sites and images that feature the pond. These cover photos of the pond itself, it’s wildlife (especially birds) as well as people just relaxing and enjoying themselves.

The quality of the photos on the web can be very impressive and atmospheric – see for example the photos above and below.

Probably the photo-sharing site Flickr has the most extensive set of photos. In particular it has a user-group dedicated to Fleet Pond Nature Reserve (see screenshot below). This group currently has 27 members and already features 550 photos.

This group is referenced in our blog in a box entitled Flickr Photos at the bottom of the rhs column and the box specifies the titles of the most recent 3 photos.

There are also a number of dedicated photographic discussion forums that mention the pond (mostly in connection with specialist bird photography).

In parallel with these public sites, Fleet Pond Society also encourages photography at the pond through competitions – see here and here. Of course this blog itself has many photos taken at the pond, mainly covering volunteer events (of which there are many) and wildlife. Here is a good example:

Preserving and maintaining the pond is an activity that benefits many people, including a wide range of photographers!

Photo credit (top two): Alexey Danilchenko (and with kind permission)
Photo credit (bottom): Michelle Salter