Over the weekend 5-6 September, there was a bit of a knees-up in Lancashire to celbrate BTCV's big five-O.
Get the flash player here: http://www.adobe.com/flashplayer
Thanks to James Nunn for the pictures.
George MacQuarrie, former Trustee
George started out with BTCV 'many decades ago' as a member of staff. He was subsequently a Trustee for many years. Find out what George thinks makes BTCV different and listen to his message of support to volunteers. 'You're part of a much bigger picture', George says.
Sue Hilder BTCV Vice Chair
Once an environmental sculptor, Sue Hilder started volunteering on practical projects with BTCV in 1989 and it has never left her side since. Over the years as a regular volunteer and Volunteer Officer she became interested in the inner workings and governance of the organisation, leading to her role today as Vice Chair of BTCV (juggled alongside her day job!). So what is it about BTCV that's so special? Find out by watching this clip of our chat with Sue.
My first 40 years
Clive Ormonde thinks he was just a regular volunteer. We would count 40 years of service as a little bit more than 'regular'!
Congratulations to BTCV for chalking up their half century. 2009 is a personal anniversary for me too, a slightly more modest 40 years as an average volunteer. My first experience of a conservation weekend was at Yateley Common in early November 1969. John Pankhurst was the leader and the group also included one Eddie Boosey. For most stalwarts their first involvement seems to be remembered as a glorious dawn of a new era, but I actually didn’t enjoy it that much. I have a vague and rather painful memory of humping railway sleepers to a pond where a causeway was being built; and that it was all rather damp and miserable. To be honest, I was in no hurry to come back for more.
But I did. A few weeks later with my spirits raised again I gave it another go, this time at a very cold Kingley Vale in Sussex. Here I found fence-line clearance more to my liking. There was still time before Christmas to squeeze in a weekend of rhododendron destruction on Brownsea Island, and by the end of that, despite a streaming cold, I was hooked.
Without having my own transport at that time and being reluctant to travel from Berkshire into London for a lift, I was rather dependent on a friend and fellow volunteer to ferry me to and from the worksite. For this I was very thankful, although it did mean I was unable to pick and choose the weekends and the locations to go to, so I became more of an occasional volunteer than a regular one. I did manage to experience one weeklong residential holiday in southeast Devon, but that was all. My life as a conservation volunteer may have fizzled out completely, but for the advent of local groups. In late 1975 I was one of several involved on the inaugural workday of the Berkshire Conservation Volunteers (BeC) and with lack of transport no longer an issue, I was now free to join in whenever I wanted.
I was now into my heyday and accumulated many ‘mandays’ of work for BeC and then for the Reading National Trust Volunteers, always happy to be an ‘Indian’ rather than a ‘Chief’. Years later the birth of my son caused me to slow down for a while, but I never stopped completely. I now consider myself a bit of a freelance worker, having given my time to seven different groups and organisations over the past year alone. I never forgot my roots though, and maintained my membership of the BTCV for many years. Indeed, during the time that the HQ was just down the road at Wallingford I was also able to help out with certain office tasks from time to time.
The BTCV has brought about no sudden and really dramatic life changing events to my life, but 40 years of passionate involvement cannot have failed to make a big change to the direction it has taken. Where I would be now and what I might be doing without it is impossible to say, but I’m quite sure my life would have been much the poorer for it. Many of the skills that I now have, my knowledge of natural history and ecology, my good health and fitness, a large circle of friends as well as a wife who appeared somewhere down the line, and just being able to be out there to appreciate the best of the British countryside at all times of the year with perhaps a few extra flowers, butterflies and birds out there because of me, these are just some of the rewards that my time as a volunteer have given me. My hope is that I can still keep active for another ten years and then like the BTCV, celebrate the big Five-O. That really would be something!
Giles Osborn from Kent has been in touch with some early memories: I first became involved in 1960 after a report in the London Evening News on the first task at Box Hill. I was not yet 16, but the Brigadier [ARMSTRONG] agreed to take me under his wing and my first task was at Michelham Priory, Sussex.
We camped in large square marquees, similar to those depicted in medieval films, with duckboards between so our naked feet were kept clean and dry. The job then was to clear the vegetation which was impeding the flow of water in the moat. I spent many weekends there in 1967 when we constructed a sluice (several times); I still have many b/w photos and detailed plans for the sluice (designer John Pankhurst).
MEMORABLE EVENTS
My first Task at the age of 16 was at Meathop Moss in Cumbria, we were accommodated at Brantwood House on the shore of lake Coniston, the former home of John Ruskin. (It had wonderful beds and a ‘drying room’) Across the lake was the town of Coniston but it was 4 miles by road. This was the first time without parental control at a pub with seasoned conserver drinkers (being a Bank Holiday 1 hour extension). For the last 3 miles I was dragged or carried back by Alan Slater. I was excused work the following day!
On a weekend coppicing in Kent near Wye, we arrived at the site in two Land Rovers, just before midnight. The "office" instructions had transposed the Ordnance map reference numbers so we had been totally at the wrong place to start with. In the days before mobile phones, contacting anyone to find out where we should have been proved difficult. Our troubles were not yet over, with snow falling, we unpacked two 12 foot ex-Army tents to find that the tent poles had been left behind. Harry Frawley, ever the most resourceful person, grabbed an axe and with the help of the Land Rover lights and a Tilley lamp commenced on the task, soon we had four chestnut tent poles.
Chairman of the Management Committee 1970 when we became BTCV.
REASONS TO BE CHEERFUL: PARTS 1 - 20
I went on my first BTCV holiday in 1989 and I’m still hooked. Along the way I’ve met lots of lovely people and had some unforgettable experiences.
That first holiday was in County Down in the north of Ireland, in the autumn. We cleared gorse from a heath, to try and stop it from being completely invaded by the wrong kind of leaves. We wore thick suede gauntlets to carry the gorse, cut and uprooted, to the fire, but the thorns still got everywhere. The weather was sunny and mild and tending the fire was very satisfying work. I had such a good time that two months later I went on another BTCV holiday, in Cardiff, my home city. We were planting trees left, right and centre. It was colder and darker but the work was just as satisfying. I spent the next few years going to different parts of Britain and Ireland. It was in Donegal that I swam at a Blue Flag beach for the first time. I’d never swum amongst live seaweed before; my local beaches were so polluted that nothing lived near the shore. Coming to think of it, maybe I shouldn’t have gone in the water… I did a week in north Wales, coppicing and rhodie-bashing. We stayed in a bunkhouse high above Harlech and I still remember the sheer beauty of the sun setting over Cardigan Bay while there was a rainbow over the mountains. I did a week with Scottish Conservation Projects as well but April in the lowlands was a bit too cold for me.
In 1999 I decided to be spread my wings and chose the BTCV holiday in Germany, partly because I’d done German at school but mainly because we were promised a visit to the Oktoberfest in Munich at the end. We did a wide variety of work all around Bavaria - from making haystacks to reducing access (yes, reducing access) to nesting areas at the lake. I learned the German names of various endangered species but I haven’t been able to use them much – funny that. We stayed in a hunting lodge with its own access to the Ammersee and when it all got too hot we’d swim in the lake and drink organic beer (after work, of course). The Oktoberfest was all I imagined and more. I'll just say this: until you’ve heard a thousand drunken Germans singing along to "Vy M C A" you haven't lived.
In 2000 I went on a BTCV Christmas task for the first time, in Wiltshire. I really enjoyed the coppicing but, quite frankly, the best bit was getting on the train a few days before Christmas and realising that whatever I’d forgotten to do it was just too late and there was no point in worrying. I spent the next few Christmases with BTCV, mainly in Dalby Forest, coppicing and burning - nice warm work. In 2004 the Christmas holiday I chose was led by Paul who’d led one of the holidays I'd done in Ireland as well.
I gradually grew more adventurous with the other holidays, going to the US (we built an 8m footbridge in five days flat, from choosing and felling the trees to putting up the hand-rails) then Hungary simply because one of the volunteers in the US had been there and recommended it. In fact, we'd worked together on a BTCV holiday in Ireland back in the '90s but we couldn't remember when exactly. In Hungary we mowed the hay and thoroughly enjoyed the hospitality. That was the first time I ever drank a glass of wine in the vineyard where it was made. I went to Albania next and was completely entranced by the World Heritage site where we were working. There was an open-air theatre festival at the site, so I saw an ancient Greek play in an original Greek amphitheatre – and The Tempest in Bulgarian (good thing I’d already seen it in the original English).
In 2004 I went to New Zealand to build a board walk around a memorial park. Rowing a Maori canoe around the coastline was a highlight as was swimming with dolphins on the day off, even though the Pacific was much, much, much colder than I’d expected. Then I went to Italy. I learned to say “12 bread rolls please” in Italian because that was our daily order at the village bakery. That was in 2005 and one day the mayor came to offer her congratulations on behalf of the council because London had won the 2012 Olympics. A few days later, she offered her condolences about the 7 July bombings. Luckily no-one in the group was directly affected.
The next year I went to Bulgaria and spent my time standing in a saline lake for hours on end extending an artificial island where Arctic terns nest. The best bit was definitely releasing storks which had recovered from their injuries back into the wild, in the presence of the Dutch ambassador (because the Netherlands fund some of the charity’s work). In 2007 I went to Japan, to do a wide variety of tasks from extending a board walk to clearing out a couple of abandoned barns that will be an educational centre one day. On one of our days off the women were dressed in kimono and had a go at flower-arranging – that’s my Facebook picture now. Last year I went to the other extreme, from one of the most technologically advanced nations on earth to one of the least: Lesotho. It was my first time in Africa and I chose Lesotho because Wales is twinned with it (honestly). We got a fair bit of work done, creating a community garden with members of a village co-operative.
So this year, my twentieth with BTCV – where to? Estonia, in July. I’ve never been further north than Scotland so I thought it was time to find out what I’ve been missing. I’m finding the working holidays are getting a bit expensive now, so I’m not sure if I’ll do another one, but it was certainly fun while it lasted.
Conserver's lament
Here's a poem from Steve Glason - an "ancient conserver" - who volunteered with the BTCV team in London in 1970s and 80s and spent 10 years with a local conservation group in Kingston-on-Thames.
Conserver's Lament
No longer working holidays
Quaint villages for weekend stays
No longer winching tangled roots
Wearing pair of muddy boots.
No longer sleeping - draughty barn
Drystone walling by a tarn
No longer clearing hedge and ditch
Bracknell near a sporting pitch.
No longer socials - drinking pub
Primrose Hill - that "Albert" hub
No longer trips on "Jenny Wren"
To Little Venice - now and then.
No longer - Chippy - Friday nights
One of those familiar sights
No longer vans in Kingley Vale
Yew trees creaking in a gale.
No longer cherished Selous Street
Collecting paper on my feet
No longer parties - 80's sounds
Houses with extensive grounds
These memories are dear to me
(Wallingford - BTCV)
The Countryside - I've done my share
Giving loving tender care.
On 5 June, volunteers and visitors to Cornwall's Lost Gardens of Heligan enjoyed good company, fine weather and trational crafts at a 50th Birthday celebration event.
Today, Nick Hanley can be found in the European Commission, Heading up Communication and Governance for the Directorate General for the Environment. But, he tells us, his path began in the 1960s when as a teenager he wanted an excuse to get out of the house at weekends, he started volunteering with BTCV and a love for the outdoors ensued.
Some more recent history now. Nick Jones describes the warm welcome he had to BTCV Hollybush in Leeds as far back as....2006!
Way back in the summer shimmerings of July 2006, I decided to pop down to Hollybush and take myself on a journey of hope and expectation to change my spiritual fortunes and self esteem, as I was in a situation of my pride and belief in my world had taken a bit of a beating emotionally.
As the gleaming smile of Jenny T said her hello and welcome, before long I was out traipsing the countryside of Ben Ryding Primary School of Ilkley, with a gentle mix of folk to pertain the job in hand. A wonderful mix of people, some lost souls, but all came to make a difference.
Dig here, paint there and strip the turf somewhere. Within a few sessions during that week a masterpiece of a Green Classroom was emerging. A Pond dipping area, mini beast area, natural foot path, planting bulbs and saplings all played a part in transforming a piece of land into a pleasant place to learn with tranquil surroundings to enjoy. For me this was the start of a caring loving relationship within the bosom the family of Hollybush Volunteers.
I remember, Hawksworth Primary School, two years ago on one of the wettest days ever - just steady rain! The job was building a pond area and doing path stone work. We had to get through clay, sand and chalk stone to lay the foundation post for the wooden slats to make the top part of the pond dipping area.
By the end of this day I was the muddiest and wettest that I have been in my life but also one of the happiest days. My arms ached when I went to sleep that night. It was worth all the effort.
Here we have something a little bit different to usual. It's common knowledge within BTCV that love frequently blossoms between volunteers and Eddie Boosey gets all that romance out of the field and onto the page with this poem. We're a bit late for Valentine's day but love knows no deadlines!
The Passionate Conserver To His Love By Eddie Boosey
Come live with me and be my love
And we will all the pleasures prove
That hills and valleys, dales and fields,
Or woods, or steepy mountain yields.
And we will sit upon the rocks
And pull the thorns out from our socks,
And, where the rambling bramble catches,
I’ll put ointment on your scratches.
And over rivers we’ll build bridges,
And I’ll put calamine where the midges
Have bitten you right to the bone,
And I’ll sympathise with every groan.
Throughout the country, we’ll clear scrub,
And in the evening I will rub
Your aching body with embrocation
‘Til your muscles find some relaxation.
And we will work throughout the land,
Conserving Britain’s wildlife, and
Later, when the wide world snoozes,
I’ll be careful of your bruises.
And everywhere we’ll improve vistas,
And I’ll put plasters on your blisters:
If these delights thy mind may move,
Then live with me and be my love.
Tim Smit looks back
I am a huge fan of the BTCV as you can imagine. What was to become The Lost Gardens of Heligan was nothing more than a complete wilderness until a team from BTCV led by the excellent Mr George Crumpler arrived with a wonderful motley crew to start the big clearance. It was addictive watching old pathways and vistas open and then seeing the matted paths rolled up like a giant carpet on forks which would be cut through by spades as they reached a weight almost too heavy for a pair of grown men to lift, revealing the perfect paths, drained and cobbled drainage channels underneath.
Countless gangs of BTCV'ers came to help through the summer and autumn of 1991 and then throughout 1992. Quite simply without them there would have been no Lost Gardens and The Nation's Favourite Garden (as voted by viewers of Gardeners World) would have remained silent, undiscovered and would have robbed millions of the pleasure that it has given them.
From the early Heligan clearances and subsequent restoration two BTCV stalwarts in particular come to mind who led and attended so many sessions and they remain friends to this day. I mentioned George Crumpler above and his able cohort was Jean Griffiths both showing an energy that would embarrass those half their age. I will never forget Jean and her gang cutting back a forest of 15ft tall brambles in the great walled garden - under it we found the only surviving Paxton Fruit House in Britain. In its day it was the people's greenhouse of choice and now there was only one left. This may not be in the scale of the discovery of the tomb of Tutankhamen, but Heligan brought a whole period of domestic history back to life and rekindled the national interest in vegetable gardening at scale - Mr Macgregor's Garden for adults! The professionalism and enthusiasm of this volunteer crew is legendary and, as BTCV reaches its 50th year it should be deeply proud. It has changed landscapes, it has provided respite for broken hearts and frustrated souls, it has provided purpose to the aimless and a darned good time to those who simply wanted to "get down and dirty" doing something practical in a new environment.
Most importantly, BTCV has played a huge part in the lives of many people teaching the simple truth of our connection to and dependence on the environment - a message whose truth and urgency has never been more needed than now. So...as we celebrate 50 years we should lift a glass to all those people whose comradeship and good heart have transformed so many places and lives for the better. Congratulations and may you go from strength to strength - we salute you.
Tim Smit, CBE
Conga on the Boardwalk
Lou Mayer was introduced to BTCV twenty years ago when her sister invited her to spend a week on a BTCV holiday. She says, "This was the start of a long involvement with the BTCV first as a volunteer, then as a member of staff. I have some fantastic memories of far flung places in Britain and Europe, I have gained a lot of good friends and it was the start of a career that I would never have considered but for my positive experiences with BTCV."
One of Lou's best BTCV memories:
Pen-y-ghent Boardwalk – Yorkshire Dales National Park
July 1988
We had a long walk, ¾ hour, to site carrying some tools and a roll of Terram, all up hill to the top of Pen-y-ghent. Luckily the wood for the boardwalk had been airlifted in by the Royal Air Force. The weather was miserable with a light drizzling rain. Before we could construct the boardwalk we had to construct dams in the gullied peat. I was barrowing stone across the peat, tripped and fell head first into a wheelbarrow and I managed to almost knock myself out. As I was sat down to recover, the decision was made to put the kettle on early for a tea break. "Where is the kettle?", the most important tool for a days work. I had left it in the van! Any volunteers to walk back to van to get it? Two hours later the kettle was put on the burner, however being on top of a hill in miserable weather the kettle took two hours to boil!
I remember sat by a wall feeling very sorry for myself with a sore nose and a week of walking up to the top of Pen-y-ghent to look forward to. I realised I had two options available to me. Option One, continue to feel sorry for myself turn into a "problem volunteer" or Option Two, pull myself together and get on with it. Perhaps it was the tea that revived me but I did pull myself together and the group worked extremely hard that week to build the board walk on top of Pen-y-ghent, in perpetual rain and mist. The last day we took a red ribbon and stereo to site with us. As soon as the last nail went into the boardwalk the group was on the look out for walkers. The first couple to step on to the boardwalk were presented with bent nails, asked to cut the ribbon before they continued on their way to the sound of 'Under the Boardwalk' playing on the stereo, followed by the whole group doing the conga. The sense of achievement was fantastic.
Andrew Daws – saving the Broads
At the age of 16, using money borrowed from his father, Andrew Daws caught a train from Lincolnshire to Norwich to take part in the first Conservation Corps holiday in Norfolk in 1959.
The Norfolk Broads were dying. By the late 1950s, Surlingham Broad, a network of secluded waterways about 6 miles east of Norwich, was choked with scrub and rubbish.
Andrew Daws was one of twelve young Conservation Corps volunteers who arrived in Surlingham on 19 August 1959 to make the Broad accessible from the road. Unlike others in the party, Andrew was already handy with an axe, but it was still heavy, physical work. They found it hard going, hacking through thick scrub, stripped to the waist amidst clouds of mosquitoes. The jungle atmosphere was caught by a reporter from the Eastern Daily Press who walked there "...through squelching mud left by recent high tides and over rotting willow logs, with vegetation tangling around in tropical profusion..." to cover this "off-beat" holiday.
Conservation Corps founder Brigadier Armstrong led the task. "He was a dear old boy who looked exactly as you’d expect," says Andrew "Army moustache, ram-rod straight, square shoulders." The joining instructions had a clipped, military air. Volunteers would be "free to disperse after morning work on 2 September." In a final military touch, the volunteers had to stand in line while waiting to be called to collect their travel expenses at the end of the task.
"The work was supplemented by formal lectures from local naturalists but there was also time for fun. It was all very innocent," Andrew recalls. The men in the party camped out near the house of AE Ellis, a noted local naturalist, later commemorated by the Ted Ellis Trust at Wheatfen Nature Reserve, while the women stayed in the house of "Mrs Bury, Cut Loke, Surlingham". One night at 11.00pm the girls sneaked out of Mrs Bury's and launched a flour bomb attack on the tents. "My specs were covered with flour!" Andrew met his first girlfriend at Surlingham and on the Saturday took her to see Norwich City and South Pacific. He still has the ticket stubs.
For Andrew, a young bird-watcher and keen rugby-player from rural Lincolnshire, it was all a big adventure. It was his first holiday without his parents. "I loved it," he says, and kept many mementos. "I liked being out in the open country and meeting strangers gave me more confidence. It was great preparation for university."
Andrew Daws is a retired City lawyer who lives in West London.
Dress khaki
David Slater was recently helping to make a video for next year's 50th Anniversary celebrations. David's a long-time volunteer, former BTCV board member and good friend to BTCV. During filming at the BTCV managed Greenwich Peninsula Ecology Park, he got out us his faithful old volunteering jacket.
Could that be the nascent BTCV's first logo?
Monkton Bat Cave: 1986
Nigel Watson writes: I was a volunteer who joined BTCV in 1972 (after an earlier period in the Cambridge Conservation Corps) and was active in BTCV until the 1990s, mainly on weekend tasks run from London but also spending a fair amount of holiday time on long residentials.
When we heard that 1986 was to be declared "National Bat Year" to promote bat conservation, a few London volunteers began mulling over ideas for a BTCV contribution. We were aware that a purpose-built artificial structure for bats to hibernate in had never been tried in the UK, so this possibility was intriguing.
We talked to some experts to find out more. The scale of the project was daunting but somehow we persevered. Things began to look up when my co-organiser, Dave Coleman, located two essentials; a site at Monkton Nature Reserve, Kent where the cave could be built, and a source of some very large concrete pipes.
Over the spring and summer of 1986, Dave's efforts paid off in obtaining donations and sponsorship from 10 companies and public utilities for the materials and heavy equipment; notably the pipes, cement, aggregate and steel plus the loan of a JCB, crane, concrete mixer and generator. Another volunteer, Paul Redway, was able to fabricate the entrance grille, and meanwhile I consulted bat experts to finalise the design - a 14 metre long tunnel, with a slope down into the entrance and a slope up towards the far end to provide a range of roost temperatures.
Construction took a month, using three full-scale weekend tasks plus several smaller midweek sessions. The latter put a few of us on site to supervise the use of heavy machinery to dig the trench, lower the pipes into position and place the backfill over them. The weekend tasks provided slightly more conventional volunteer work for around 15 people at a time, who mixed a lot of concrete and tamped a lot of chalk. This coincided with some particularly hot weather. As the site was a sun-trap in the bottom of the chalk quarry, a great deal of sweat was poured out - and later replaced in the traditional way by beer.
By the second weekend, the cave pipes were in place and covered over; and some of us forsook the open air for the dark, damp interior to build the brickwork for the roost sites.
Three years later, the Kent Bat Group recorded the first two bats (both were Brown Long-eared Bats - Plecotus auritus) hibernating in the cave.
[Extracted from a much longer article, thank you Nigel.]
Joseph Orton
Joseph Orton first volunteered in 1968 or '69 and writes:
It's wonderful that you are about to celebrate your 50th year. I haven't been directly in touch with you for over 10 years. The last time was when I left lots of my tools for BTCV London (near Kings Cross ) when I took redundancy from my teaching job at Kingsway College over 10 years ago. But the heyday of my years with BTCV /The Conservation Corps was from 1968-1974.
I first met the Conservation Corps at Bix Bottom in the Chilterns, but here's a list of all the tasks I can recall going on as a volunteer and as a task leader, mainly weekend whilst I was working as a lowly Clerical Civil Servant in the Home Office and at the Nature Conservancy HQ at Belgrave Square:
Wye and Crundale Nature Reserve
Bix Bottom
Bure Marshes
Studland Heath / Wareham
Clare Castle
Pewsey Vale
Kingsley Vale
Petworth House Home Farm (felling dutch elm diseased trees)
Felling Conifers in a Park in Birmingham
Fingringhoe Wick
Wodwalton Fen
Holme Fen
Chippenham Fen
Oxshott Common
Blean Woods Canterbury
Ashtead Common
Box Hill
Cairngorms (maintaining deer extraction paths )
Digging out Blists Hill Furnaces Coalbrookdale ( working for Neil Cousins )
Danebury Rings Hampshire (frequently - a favourite )
Old Park Wood - butterflies
Ivinghoe Beacons
Boarstall Duck Decoy
Corfe Castle
That's all I can remember off hand. Unfortunately, I've lost all my photographs.
My most memorable time was when the Corps was at the Zoo. I've still got my Leader's Training Certificate from Green Park in 1972.
I wonder how my old chums are getting on? They were:
Jeff Redgrave, "Raz", Les Oxley, Pete Broomfield and his lovely wife Georgina, Simon Hicks, Richard Jennings.
It was Andrew and Anne who lived in Princess Road, Primrose Hill who organised the Corps, when the Corps was based next to the Fauna Preservation Society at London Zoo.
I was briefly a volunteer member of the Trust, probably not too successfully in regular attendance. BTCV moved to Selous Street and I worked there on tools and vehicles. I'll try and recall and send some tales from the Corps / BTCV. If anyone needs a reminder of what I look like, then and now, there are some pics on flickr that I have set up for any old BTCV chums who want to take a look at the hazards of ageing.
best wishes,
Joe Orton (in Retirement- if possible for an old conservationist)
Wirksworth
Flora volunteered between 1997 and 2002, starting at the BTCV centre in Wirksworth, Derbyshire:
"I also worked for BTCV in South Yorkshire from 1998 - 2001.
And I remember singing songs from Snow White on Ramsley Moor in Derbyshire in the pouring rain as we felled about the 500th birch tree of the week. We then used the brash piles as mini trampolines. It was safe - honest!
Also living in the Dale and being part of the wide social circle that you became part of as a VO in Wirksworth in 1997.
Woodwalton memory
I was one of the people on the first – or perhaps the second? – project scrub-clearing on Woodwalton Fen. One of the other volunteers was Michael Chinery, now well known for his field guides. I really enjoyed the week's work.
Our group had a photograph on the back page of the Times with me on top of what was to become a large bonfire of cleared scrub.
I’m still interested in conservation – I have 20 acres of my own which I have for conservation purposes and I’m the vice-Chair of the Campaign to Protect Rural England in the North East of England.
David FruinMore Trees Please
From Green Care, Cameroon
Isle of Wight 1990
Helen Butler writes: In 1990, I was made redundant from banking and had repetitive strain injury so I decided to look for something 'in the countryside' to do. I was advised to join BTCV which, for someone with a background in horses, farming and banking opened my eyes to a totally different way of looking at the world. They say 'never volunteer for anything' – well I did. It seemed innocuous enough at the time. All I did was respond to a request for a volunteer to ...more on flickr
Surlingham Wood 1959
Rob Morley writes: I was a volunteer on one of the first (THE first?) residential (two weeks) conservation project of the Conservation Corps in July 1959. It was two weeks opening up an old routeway to Surlingham Broad. The client was the Norfolk Naturalists Trust. We were hosted by their General Secretary, Ted Ellis. The 12 of us (6 boys, six girls) were all sixth formers...more on flickr
BTCV is registered in England as a limited company (976410) and as a charity in England (261009) and Scotland (SCO39302)
Registered Office: BTCV, Sedum House, Mallard Way, Doncaster DN4 8DB
