Good news

I said there would be good news and there is! On June 22nd seven members who attended our coordinating group meeting agreed to form a committee. I expect others will join in soon.
We now have a chairman,treasurer,minutes sec,press sec and an events organiser. That is good news.

Last time I mentioned TV programmes on wildlife, now we have the Independant newspaper starting a campaign to support conservation for wild plants and bugs. Here are links to the two organisation being supported with 20p from the sale of every paper on 24th June: http://www.buglife.org.uk/ and http://www.plantlife.org.uk/. Plantlife has two nature reserves in the area within reach . One at Bawdrip in Somerset and another in Dorset not far from Crewkern. Both are managed on similar lines to our Wildlife Trust wild flower meadows and should be worth a visit.The Big Switch campaign has been running this week and hopefully will encourage a growing number of people to be careful with their use of energy. The web site is: http://www.bigswitch.org.uk/ The largest number of pledges currently showing on the web is for buying local food with a significant number of people switching to a green tariff for electricity. Here's a web site to compare tarrifs: http://www.uswitch.com/info/compare-electricity.asp

Back to our committee which has also started trying to put together a programme of visits to reserves and evening meetings for members on a range of topics. We must submit our programme for printing by July 10th and also a write up for the SWT magazine.A big task for us is to communicate with our 550+ local members only a small proportion of which have given us an email address. We will try to use the next SWT magazine to write to them with local news. Perhaps including the reference to this blog!
We are hoping to get together a collection of photographs of wildlife on our local reserves so all offers will be considered.
Dont forget that if you just register with "Blogger" you can post comments on this blog diary. Dont forget either that the whole world can read what you put! ( I havn't told many people yet so we are reasonable private at the moment!).
Thats all for now.
PS. The photo I took late in the evening on the Gt Breach Wood Nature Reserve on June 20th.
It is, I believe, a Butterfly Orchid- platanthera chlorantha.

Busy times

Heart of the Levels Wildlife Group

Since my last post on June 4th there have been plenty of opportunites to learn more about wildlife.

David Attenborough presented his latest TV programmes covering evidence to support the view that humans are at least contributing to global warming to the extent that he now believes we need to change our ways if we wish to limit the damage mankind is doing to our planet.

Bill Oddie has completed this years Springwatch series of fascinating live TV coverage of bird and mammal activites in the UK Impressive liveTV shots of otters in the ShetlandIsles and from cameras in Devon fixed in bird nesting boxes and nests elswhere will probably encourage people to buy their own specialist cameras to watch bird life in their own gardens.

I was able to visit more reserves at Catcott Heath and two reserves near Cheddar Gorge at Cheddar Wood and Black Rock. To visit these widely spread reserves we need to arrange car sharing and provide details of access arrangements. The range of habitats and variety of flora and fauna is remarkable.

In grassland meadows we can now find orchids flowering. Early purple , pyramidal and bee orchids have all been seen in the last few weeks. The picture above ( showing a Pyramidal Orchid I believe) was taken at Catcott Heath reserve on 6th June this year.

The Wildlife Trust is running its Big Switch campaign and members and the public are being urged to find ways for a week to reduce their energy consumption in four areas. Buying local food, switching to low energy light bulbs, switching to an electricity supplier who can provide electricity from renewable sources such as Good Energy Ltd and by reducing their use of cars as far as possible. I have made pledeges on all four areas but will find it difficult to meet all my self imposed targets. For information go to: http://www.bigswitch.org.uk/

The next meeting of our coordination group is on 22nd June and I hope we can formalise our committee and set a programme for the next 12 months. We also need to find ways to organise communication with our 550 local members hopefully by hand delivery to avoid high postal costs.

Next weeks blog posting should be full of good positive news!

The 20km walk and other things

Heart of the Levels Wildlife Group

The Walk.
Going on from my last post we weren't able to organize a stall at the Langport International Festival of Walking on the 3rd June. I have to admit that my lateness in confirming the arrangements for a table, the display boards and most importantly a rota of members to be present led to a decision to abandon the idea. Nobody was too disappointed by this I'm sure. As it turned out it was not a good venue for catching peoples attention since most walkers were more concerned with rest and recuperation after a very hot day in the sun and some steep hills. My offer to walk to raise money for our group met with some success! I completed 20km in the sun and should have raised about £40 for wildlife. I have a stamped certificate to prove my completion of the walk.
Next committee meeting.
Trying to find a date for our next meeting is a little difficult due to other commitments and holidays. However we must meet to formalize our committee structure and start to draw up our programme for the next 12 months.
I am now going for Thursday June22 nd and waiting to hear from members as to their availability!