Annual Reports

2023

Chair’s report for the 2023 AGM of SBV

Members – the representative of SMB school is now Trish Hamlen who sadly could not come tonight for your welcome to her, but she has already been putting forward suggestions.

Additional members are Charlotte and Adam Rimmer, who have really added to our knowledge with their knowledge of wildlife and composting, special mention to Adam’s excellent working model of a composter at the Activity Day and the Bat Walk afterwards led by Charlotte.

Lesley Sarson is also here tonight and has volunteered to help with keeping the website up to date, and improve our communitcations on Facebook etc.  So welcome Lesley. 

Special mentions for the year are

The Activity Day, organised by Nik. 

100 people turned out for the Activity Day on 17 September, organised by Nik where there was much to see and learn:

• How to do an energy audit on your home,
• The effect of insulation,
• easy composting,
• Recycling & upcycling fabrics and yarn into amazing new garments, shoes and works of art, 
• Swopping plants, recipes for leftover foods,
• Packaging other than plastic

The Repair Cafe, which is ever more popular.  A big thank you to Andy and Leigh who help Nik with all the repairs.  Two new signs have been delivered from the printers, one for an A-frame outside the George, and the other to go on the bridge, as reminders of the monthly sessions.

Toad Patrol:  26 days of patrols with 61 hours of volunteering:  631 toads saved and 39 squashed; 12 frogs saved and 3 squashed.  A big thank you to all the volunteers, how many Caroline?

Hirst Meadow:  Caroline has done an amazing job keeping volunteers coming to help dig out weeds and plant wildflowers to attract ever more wildlife.  So thank you, Caroline. 

A -= Z of recycling – another thank you to Caroline for keeping it updated and Nik for putting it onto the website. 

Thermal Camera – the uptake for use has not been as great as expected, so perhaps next winter with more publicity it will get more use.

So thank you to all the group for all their hard work.

Katie Dixon

Chair, Sustainable Bourne Valley

 

2021

Founded in January 2019, the group is led by its committee of six.  Sadly we have lost a couple of founder members.  Special mention must go to our previous chairman, Charlotte Reid, who accepted an offer of her dream job, and has found it very time-consuming and so retired from the group.  Charlotte was very effective in setting up SBV and an excellent communicator and we miss her abilities.  Kay Bone, an expert on wildflower planting, moved to Wales and her knowledge is also much missed.  But instead we have recruited a representative from SMB Primary School, Sam Baxter aiding communication with the school, and Rose Plincke who has been a real help on all projects.  The Group is now in need of an enthuisiastic and effective communicater, to keep the SBV’s projects fresh on social media.  

Over the last 12 months the transformation of Hirst Meadow  into a wildlife haven has progressed but not as much as the Group had hoped.   Covid meant that the volunteers could not keep the brambles and nettles under control. And then the autumn mowing of the meadow was not well timed due to misunderstanding.  Lessons have been learnt, so in 2022 and with the many helpers on the Meadow What’s App Group, we feel that progress is being made.  We had the pleasure last year of seeing some of the wild flowers that had been planted and look forward to even more this year. An eco-friendly sign for the site, of which here are a few copies, is in draft form, which will explain the work and what we hope the project will achieve.  You can see QR codes on the Sign to access information on the SBV website.  

The toad patrolsl in SMB during the last two springs have produced some interesting statistics. In 2021 an incredible 647 toads and 24 frogs were helped to cross the roads.  387 toads were picked up,  30 squashed, with 7 newts saved and 1 squashed.  Other Patrols around the country have reported similar reductions in numbers this year.  This could be due to there being only two wet and warm nights in the whole of February, March and into April this year.  Our SMB patrollers nobly went out on many other nights but only helped one or two toads.  They also exteneded survellance to between the BVI and the George finding toads walking up the middle of the road.  Again many thanks to committee member Caroline Hoyes for being our toad patrol manager and spending many hours coordinating our volunteers and weather forecasts!

On the energy side, we have set up The Cosy Homes Project. We were very pleased to be able to use  a donation from the Flower Show Committee to buy a Thermal Imaging Camera which idenitifies Cold Spots in housing. Details for borrowing the Camera are on the SBV website. With feedback from those using the Camera the SBV hope to build up a view of the state of insulation in the valley. 

With the easing of covid restrictions the Repair Cafe has returned to The George at 10am on the first Saturday of each month.  It is a great place to not only get things mended, but also have a chat over a cup of coffee. 

SBV website has an ever increasing number of interesting and informative articles.  Have a look at:

• A – Z of recycling – which is being constantly updated in line with changing facilities
• the  wildlife, bird and plant surveys for Hirst Meadow and Black Garden
• the lake and rivulet survey
• ideas for eco friendly gardening
• sustainable food choices
• through the Give Back scheme, recycling furniture, electical goods etc
• the Parish Dark Skies 
• Cosy Homes Project, including borrowing the Thermal Imaging camera

Next project in the sights of the SBV team is getting group discounts to help everyone take further steps to add to all the others in reducing the  world’s carbon output.  

Katie Dixon

Chair, Sustainable Bourne Valley

 

2019/2020

It has been a busy, event-filled, and educational first year for Sustainable Bourne Valley. Founded in January 2019, the group – led by its committee of six – was established to protect the environment and to promote sustainable living in the Bourne Valley.

Our first job was to create a logo and identity for the group and to build networks that would enable us to promote and share ideas for sustainable living. This led to the creation of a logo, a Facebook Page and a group website (www.sustainablebournevalley.or.uk ) where we post news and articles about sustainable gardening, planet-friendly food choices, and renewable energy as well as a detailed A-Z local recycling guide. So far, almost 700 people have visited our website and on Facebook we have reached around 1,500 people each month and engaged with an average of 500.

In April 2019, we applied to St Mary Bourne Parish Council for permission to use a plot of Council-owned land behind Hirst Copse to create a wildlife haven. The transformation of this land, now known as Hirst Meadow, was to become our first hands-on project. After consulting with Hirst Copse residents at the Annual Parish meeting, we left the plot to floursh over the summer to see what was already growing there. In September, the meadow was mown and the huge brambles which had taken over one side of the plot were heavily cut back to make space for tree planting.

In October, we organised a successful art exhibition at the Club Room Art Space on the theme of ‘improving our environment’. The event attracted numerous local artists -including painters, potters and woodturners – and raised £168 through commissions on work sold. Huge thanks to Kay Bone for organising this event.

In November, we co-organised the ‘free-range’ Big Breakfast with Karen Croft and Jo Boxer with the aim of raising funds and promoting sustainable food choices. All the bacon, sausages and eggs were sourced from local free-range farms and the jams, marmalades and apple juice were also locally produced. Information about our group and sustainable food choices was provided at each table.

Also in November, we invited children from St Mary Bourne Primary School to join us in planting trees and seeds at Hirst Meadow. All together we planted 11 trees, which included spindle and hazels, and an assortment of wild flower seeds and the children had a great time learning about nature and jumping on the seeds to bed them in!

Having done the lion’s share of the winter groundwork in Hirst Copse, our attention turned to toads in December. After hearing reports of toads being squashed on the roads between The George and the Derrydown Clinic, we decided to register the site as an offical ‘toad crossing’ with Froglife. In just one wet and windy evening alone during Storm Dennis, we saved an incredible 93 toads and 12 frogs from being squashed. Many thanks to committee member Caroline Hoyes for being our toad patrol manager and spending many hours coordinating our volunteers and weather forecasts!

2020 was a difficult year for everyone. Nonetheless, we continued to carry out essential work at Hirst Meadow and before the lockdown began, we managed to organise a second session there with children from St Mary Bourne primary who helped us plant some more trees and flowers. We also organised two excellent volunteer sessions to help dig up the blackberry roots to stop them taking over the planned woodland area.

Thanks to our fundraising, and a generous donation from the Flower Show Committee, we have been able to buy plants ands tools for Hirst Meadow and we are also planning to install an eco-friendly sign at the site to explain the work we’re doing there and what we hope the project will achieve.

There are a number of people we would like to thank by name, without whom we would not have made such great progress. Special thanks go to Allan Hitchcock, Jenny Cutbill, Chris Palmer, Gill Evans, Jonathan Rau, Sophie and Peter Martin, Oliver Madge and Jeanette Davies.

I would also like to thank my fellow committee members, Kay Bone, Caroline Hoyes, Hannah Shaw, Katie Dixon and Nik Cross for all their hard work and commitment to all our projects in both fair and foul weather.

Covid restrictions permitting, we look forward to developing our projects further during 2021 –beginning with our toad patrol – and we look forward to working with our growing band of volunteers to help protect the environment and promote sustainable living in our beautiful Bourne Valley.

Charlotte Reid

Chair (2019 & 2020), Sustainable Bourne Valley