Countryman Diary - August 2010
Blow to country crafts
The college that trained many of the country’s top craftspeople will soon close its doors in spite of the Heritage Lottery Fund just having announced £17 million of Lottery funding for skills training.
Closure of the New Entrants Training Scheme (NETS) at Hereford College, with its excellent record of getting students straight into full-time employment, has prompted an outcry from crafts organisations. It highlights a national crisis in training provision: there are jobs available, master craftspeople willing to pass the skills on and people wishing to learn — but the support and infrastructure for craft training is inconsistent.
Ian Peake, principal at Hereford College, explains: “It is with great regret that the college faces the closure of these courses due to changed national funding priorities and cuts in adult learning funding.”
The courses in forgework, thatching, woodwork, wheelwrighting and upholstery have been running for over thirty years and are widely recognised by the industries concerned. However, because they do not offer a low-level NVQ level 2 qualification, they are not a priority for the Skills Funding Agency, and so are being axed.
Robin Wood, of the Heritage Crafts Association, says: “The problem stems from traditional crafts falling outside the remit of all government agencies. Recognised by neither arts nor heritage organisations, there is nobody to protect traditional skills in the way that English Heritage protects buildings.
“When we hear about the annual budgets of quangos like the SFA (£42 billion) and Sector Skills Councils, it is very frustrating to see a centuries-old crafts skill such as sievemaking in danger of dying out for the sake of £5,000, which is all it would cost for Mike Turnock [the country’s last sievemaker who is retiring this year] to train his successor.”
Meanwhile, at a very human level, the decision to cut NETS is a real blow for many people, particularly those learners part-way through the two-year course, who will not be able to complete their studies.
Funding was due to be cut in July as we were going to press.
Butterflies to benefit
The Devon Wildlife Trust has been awarded £257,469 to help boost the fortunes of a number of fritillary butterfly species on Dartmoor. The money (spread over three years) comes from Viridor Credits Environmental Company, through the Landfill Communities Fund. It will go towards conservation work at five of the charity’s key nature reserves: Blackadon, Dart Valley, Dunsford, Emsworthy on Dartmoor, and Marsland on the north coast of the county.
The much-needed grant will enable the charity to purchase an alpine tractor which is specially designed for safe use on steep slopes like those found in Dartmoor’s valleys, along with quad bike, enabling them to better manage the sites for these rare and threatened species. The grant will also support training and survey work which will be carried out over the period to monitor the success of the project.
The habitat management techniques for much of the conservation work have been developed over the past twenty years by senior reserves officer Gary Pilkington at DWT’s Marsland nature reserve. Numbers of small pearl and pearl-bordered fritillaries have increased dramatically over that period, bucking the national trend of decline. The work focuses on managing areas of bracken to increase room for violets, the fritillaries’ food plant, which grow beneath.
Game, set and mouse
With Wimbledon out of the way for another year, the Wildfowl and Wetlands Trust (WWT) are hoping that old tennis balls could be just the thing to give harvest mice an advantage this year.
Conservationists at WWT Slimbridge Wetland Centre in Gloucestershire reckon they could make ideal homes for our smallest mammal which is under threat. John Crooks, mammal manager, explains:
“We are hoping it will be a case of game, set and mouse! I have cut small penny-sized holes in the balls and put straw inside and they seem to be taking very well to them.
“We have about thirty harvest mice in our collection here and we are hoping that the tennis balls will make them feel secure so that they breed well this year.
“A few years ago numbers of the mice in the wild did fall but they are starting make a comeback as the
many populations have moved to new nesting sites such as hedgerows and wetlands.”
Their breeding season is from May to September. In the wild they weave circular nests out of grasses and attach them to stems high above the ground, in which they have litters of four to six young.
Anyone for tennis?… a harvest mouse sets up home at WWT Slimbridge Wetland Centre. Photograph © James Lees.
|
New countryside charity
Well done Prince Charles for launching a new charity to help support our most impoverished rural areas. The Prince’s Countryside Fund, which has attracted funding of more than £1 million from big businesses, is hoping more cash will be raised to improve the long-term viability of the countryside and communities — in particular small-scale family farms.
The fund already has the support of large retailers including Waitrose, and is the Prince’s nineteenth charity as he continues his commitment to the countryside and its farmers.
Oops!
Several readers pointed out the typing error in a date in last month’s magazine when we had someone living for more than 357 years. So I enjoyed reading this mistake, which was sent
in to me by a reader, from a local magazine:
“This evening at 7pm there will be a hymn singing in the park across from the church. Bring a blanket and come prepared to sin.”
Competition Winners
Winners of the May crossword are Mr J Rendall, Chesham, Bucks; - Bruce Bramhall, Bradford, Yorks; and Mrs M Berry, Smethwick.
Thank you to all those who entered.
Paul Jackson
Editor
|
|
