More than
60 people attended the Annual General Meeting of the Radnorshire
Wildlife Trust at The Metropole, Llandrindod Wells, last Friday
(September 30th) - one of the biggest turnouts on record. They
were rewarded with an upbeat account of the Trust’s achievements
over the previous year.
Trust chairman Penny Hurt told members that
highlights of the year included the successful completion of
the Heritage Lottery Fund project. This project, which had been
very well managed throughout, had left the Trust’s nature
reserves in good shape. Another highlight was the purchase of
land at Cwm yr Ychen, near Pant-y-Dwr, linking the Trust’s
existing woodland reserves at Cefn Cenarth North and Cefn Cenarth
South.
The financial status of the Trust was now healthy,
with the deficits of the previous two years transformed into
an operating surplus. As Trust treasurer Sally Holtermann explained,
this had been achieved by increased income from a range of sources
combined with reductions in costs and careful financial management.
The Trust was particularly grateful to the
late Dr Brian Baughan, whose generous legacy had enabled the
Trust to continue to fund the post of Reserves Officer after
the Heritage Lottery Fund project had ended.
Once the formalities were over Conservation
Manager Julian Jones gave a talk intriguingly entitled ‘Yolk
Ring, Weasel’s Snout and Flapjacks’.
All became clear when he explained that his
subject was the re-introduction of organic arable farming at
Gilfach, the Trust’s flagship reserve near Saint Harmon.
A crop of organic oats has been harvested this year. Weasel’s
snout is a weed of arable crops, and ‘yolk ring’ is
a Gloucestershire name for the yellow hammer, which feeds on
the seeds of arable weeds. Thus the Gilfach oats, as well as
making good flapjacks, also help birds whose survival is threatened
by modern intensive farming.
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