Sunday 25th May 2025 - Spring Bank Holiday weekend - no workday

Removing fencing and tree guards at Lyme Park on Sunday 11th May 2025

Today should have been at Erddig but unfortunately they had to cancel at the last minute so a big thank you to Lyme Park for coming up with a workday for us.  It is much appreciated.

We met ranger Jason in the main car park and as there were only four of us he said we could park in the volunteer car park by the stables.  Phew!  That saved a steep walk.

Our job was to remove deer fencing up in Lantern Wood, so Jason loaded up the Kabuto with our bags etc. and we met him up at the top.

Youth rangers had been working on the two sections in the week so it turns out that we didn't need to remove many staples or lift out many of the inner posts we mainly had to collect the posts and stack them.  Then we pulled all the metal fencing down onto an even path and rolled it up.  Easy bit done now we had to take out the straining posts.

Well to cut a long story short, after a lot of hard work, especially in the heat, we managed it, and I do mean hard work as they were tall posts that were in the ground by a good 3 feet.

After we had moved everything from both worksites and stacked in one spot ready for collection, we made our way down to an area behind the gardens where we started to remove tree guards.  On the way down David and Victor decided that the way to get from one side of a wall to the other was via the dog hole rather than the stile!

It was a very hot day and a big thank you goes out to my colleagues and Jason for their hard work in these conditions, and also for their company.

Christine

38th AGM on Thursday 8 May 2025

We held our AGM tonight by zoom starting at 7:30pm.

Eight members attended:
Adrian Potts, Ally Hardy, Daniel Black, Denise Clark, Emma Summerhayes, Hazel Pryor, Jenny Pitcock and Sue Bonner.

Apologies for absence were received from:

Andy Hill, Christine Hill, Andy Screen, Charlie Spiller, Jean MacDonald, Neil Bonner and Karin Frood

The following matters were covered:

Minutes of 2024 AGM

Chairman's Report for the year ended 31 March 2025

Treasurer's Report for the year ended 31 March 2025

Election of the committee for 2025-26

AOB

After the AGM we had an interesting talk for an hour (including Q&A) from Issy Bovaird, ex-MNTV and now Lead Ranger, Alderley Edge.

Issy joined Alderley Edge from Lyme Park one year ago and has been getting to grips with what’s happening and what’s not quite right.  It’s been a difficult first year impacted by funding cuts post-covid (recruitment freezes, spending freezes) and to mitigate enforced cost increases (National Minimum Wage, employer National Insurance).  Alderley Edge has had to make cutbacks, for example plans to give visitors a better welcome (car park project) have been paused.

 

She talked about current and future projects at Alderley Edge in the context of the Trust’s recently announced new strategy for the next decade and beyond:

 

To restore nature – not just on National Trust land, but everywhere

To end unequal access to nature, beauty and history

To inspire millions more people to care and take action

 

To restore nature:

Examples at Alderley include insect surveys (to get a baseline for the insects Alderley has today) and “veteranising” trees (deliberately damaging their bark) to make them more hospitable to bugs.

Nine volunteers have been trained in baiting and trapping badgers so the badgers can be vaccinated against TB.

New groups are volunteering at Alderley: five schools have made bug hotels and some companies have done footpath work.

 

To end unequal access

Alderley have removed some gates and widened others.  They are doing lots of footpath work so that people can get around the woods.  The new Holy Well bridge went in to today.

 

To inspire people:

Trust staff are getting older and it is very important to get young people involved with the Trust and its work.  Alderley have an apprentice ranger for another year (who can work with us on Sundays) and Hare Hill is getting its own apprentice ranger.  Meanwhile, Tim Ryan (also ex-MNTV) continues to work two days per week.

See above re other volunteer groups getting involved at Alderley.

  

Bosley Cloud is a property covered by Issy and her team.  We talked about the access difficulties (uphill slog with tools to worksites) that we know deter members from going and wondered if anyone in MNTV has a 4x4 to drive tools up Gosberryhole Lane to the boundary with the open land.  The Congleton Harriers no longer do workdays there with Tim.

 

All in all, Issy’s first year at Alderley has been busy and next year is likely to be busier still with the requirement to do more for less.  We have several Alderley workdays in the programme and look forward to helping her out.

Daniel Black
MNTV Chairman

Sunday 4th May 2025 - Early May Bank Holiday weekend - no workday