Folly Farm

Features from Wildlife magazine Wildlife articles 2008 -- Spring 2008 -- ::Severn Barrage ::The Variety of life ::A year at Willsbridge ::Willsbridge comes of age ::Reaching out - Willsbridge ::Round the reserves Wildlife articles 2007 -- Autumn 2007 -- ::Thinking BIG ::Watery webs:the pond network ::Wildlife in the landscape ::Variety of life ::How to be a climate friend ::Seasonal stroll - Walborough ::Round the reserves -- Summer 2007 -- ::The Folly Farm appeal ::Weston Big Wood-biodiversity at its best ::The variety of life ::How to capture a butterfly ::How to get to know an orchid ::Seasonal stroll - WestonBigWood ::Reserves update -- Spring 2007 -- ::Folly Farm - a very special place ::Making a difference at Folly Farm ::How find the magic at Folly Farm ::Seasonal stroll at Folly Farm ::Magic spots at Folly Farm ::Batscapes ::Climate challenge ::Variety of Life - the Ponways project ::Round the reserves Wildlife articles 2006 -- Autumn 2006 -- ::The Severn Estuary ::Bird Watch results ::How to identify garden birds ::Making space for wildlife ::How does your garden grow? ::Round the reserves -- Summer 2006 -- ::Going for green ::Stand up and be counted ::Happy birthday NSLMP ::Holi day - a riot of spring colour ::Avon's species-rich grassland ::How to photograph dragonflies ::The Big Switch ::Round the reserves -- Spring 2006 -- ::How to identify winter water birds ::Make 2006 the year you... ::Invasive invasion ::Sowing the seeds: Willsbridge Mill ::Round the reserves Wildlife articles 2005 -- Autumn 2005 -- ::Indentify common funghi ::Build a hedgehog hideaway ::Big Bird Watch ::Champions for wildlife ::Round the reserves ::Seeds of the futre: Willsbridge Mill -- Summer 2005 -- ::Restoring Folly Farm ::How to become bee-friendly ::How to identify the butterflies of spring ::Save our seas ::The variety of life: hedgerows ::Round the reserves ::25 Ways to make a difference -- Spring 2005 -- ::The variety of life: water voles ::The Avon Biodiversity Action Plan ::How to take really good wildlife photos ::How to help your garden grow ::Round the reserves ::Seasonal strolls: Browns Folly ::Sowing the seeds: for wildlife for people ::Sowing the seeds: looking back

Sowing the seeds

looking back

In the blink of an eye

Rupert Higgins has been closely involved with the Trust's conservation work since 1983 and we asked him what difference he thinks the Trust has made in this time...

“A week, as everyone knows, is a long time in politics. By contrast, 25 years is a blink of an eye for wildlife, where the lifetime of a veteran tree is measured in hundreds of years and of an ancient woodland in thousands. Despite this, when I thought back to the state of wildlife in Avon in the early 1980's, the changes that have occurred in those 25 years are striking. Who in 1980 would have predicted that both raven and peregrine would be breeding annually in the Avon Gorge, or that otters would have returned to almost all of Avon's rivers ? All the news is not good, of course. For many people the first cuckoo of the year has now become the only cuckoo of the year and numbers of yellowhammer, skylark and several other once familiar birds are a fraction of those breeding 25 years ago. I could go on, but the question you've asked is: how different would things have been without the Avon Wildlife Trust?

The most obvious part of our conservation work has always been the acquisition and management of nature reserves and the contribution that these have made to Avon's biodiversity (that's a word I wouldn't have used 25 years ago) is immense. Both of Avon's populations of moonwort (a bizarre fern) are on Trust reserves as are all of Avon's marsh helleborines, stripe-winged grasshoppers and keeled skimmer dragonflies. To see what would have happened without the Trust all you have to do is to look at the slopes in the field beyond Dowlings Wood, just outside the Folly Farm reserve. When I first went to look at Folly Farm in 1985 these slopes were just the same as the fields that are now in the reserve - ablaze with the flowers of dyer's greenweed, devil's-bit scabious and a host of other plants. Sadly, we were unable to buy this field with the rest of the site and within weeks of the auction the new owner had dowsed the field in fertilisers, replacing the patchwork of purples, yellows and other colours with a blanket of bright green. If the Trust hadn't been there, I am certain that this would have happened at Folly Farm too.

Conservation work doesn't stop at reserves, however, and from the start the Trust was a trail-blazer in trying to influence the management of the far larger areas of land, from large farms and forests to urban road verges and parks. The Trust was also one of the first nature conservation organisations to realise that understanding the planning system and searching through documents such as local plans was a vital part of conservation work.

I have no doubt at all that the Trust has done more than any other local organisation to ensure that Avon remains an area rich in wildlife, with water voles in Avonmouth, herb-rich grassland at Latteridge and snipe at Weston Moor and offering enrichment to the lives of everyone who lives here.”

25-Year Highlights - our nature reserves

Once upon a time

Andrew Lea was the first Chair of Avon Wildlife Trust, and here he shares his memories of the very early days...

“My own introduction to the world of Avon's wildlife started mostly by cutting it down! I joined the Bristol Conservation Corps in the early 1970s and our Sunday forays into adjacent nature reserves with saws and mattocks in the name of wildlife and habitat management gave me a good grounding in what we had within 30 miles of Bristol and how to look after it.

The idea of a new Trust for the then recently formed County of Avon was the brainchild of a number of visionaries associated with our neighbours in Somerset and Gloucestershire. They saw that we needed a new approach, and that the slightly tweedy conventional attitudes of established county Trusts mightn't go down too well with a younger and more urban population. I agreed to become involved with what was called the Avon Wildlife Trust Project with a brief to do all the necessary day-to-day work to set up a brand new Wildlife Trust from scratch. Attached to this was a conservation habitat survey for the whole of the county, an educational and promotional function, and a liaison function to engage with other voluntary and statutory bodies. We started in the summer of 1979 and the Trust was to be launched within a year!

Leaflets and pamphlets were drawn and printed, and a talk and slide show was put together and the team went out to talk to anyone anywhere to tell them all about our new idea. Not everybody liked it. The local government reorganisation of 1974 had not been well received in the new county and many well-meaning people wanted nothing to do with it. They couldn't see why we - a conservation organisation which in their eyes should therefore be preserving the former status quo - should want to identify with the alien new structure and worse still, adopt its name. They didn't like the term 'wildlife' which to them was redolent of tigers and big game rather than spotted orchids and snipe. It wasn't always easy to convince our critics that the name wasn't as important as the concept of bringing an involvement and appreciation of wildlife conservation to an audience who might not have thought that way before.

Particularly controversial was our stress on emphasising wildlife conservation outside of formal nature reserves and in urban areas. 'Wildlife on walls', and 'mini-beast safaris', were concepts just too bizarre for many to contemplate. Support came from unexpected quarters, though. The Bristol City Parks department was amongst the most encouraging and did not show us the door when we suggested that Ashton Court meadows were of major conservation value and even more outrageously that we'd like a piece of Brandon Hill to develop and manage as an urban
nature reserve!

Gradually the traditionalists began to be won over and the outline of the new Trust began to take shape. We began to persuade existing members of the Somerset and Gloucestershire Trusts in the Avon area to transfer to us on 'changeover day'. We started to build up a new membership of our own in advance of the launch. The winner in our logo competition came up with a heron. The otherwise thoughtful and encouraging Chief Executive of one District Council told me we were ultimately doomed since in his view the County of Avon would have a short shelf-life and would soon disappear. He was right at least in one particular!

We wanted a launch of some significance for the new Trust. Through good contacts in the BBC, we were able to schedule an outside broadcast of Radio 4's 'Wildlife Question Time' panel in May 1980 from the Wills Memorial Building at Bristol University. We invited everyone who'd helped with the project (and everyone else we wanted to impress). It felt like a coming of age. The Avon Wildlife Trust was launched!”

This is an extract from a history of the Avon Wildlife Trust, compiled by Mike Dawson, one of the founders of the Trust. Copies are available for £2.50 (to cover costs) - please send a cheque made out to Avon Wildlife Trust to 32 Jacobs Wells Road, Bristol BS8 1DR.