Keeping in touch - edition 10

Dear All

Although we are now coming out of lockdown I wanted to send you a wee email with a few points from us and from properties we work at.

Firstly, as a reminder we have a weekend organised for your delight ... Summer in Snowdonia on 3-5 September.  It's always been a popular weekend and weather has always been good to us.  Until 2013 we went at the end of October to help marshall the Snowdonia Marathon, where it always rained, but when the National Trust stopped organising it we stopped going.  That was until 2015 when we realised that they may have stopped organising it but why should we stop going to a beautiful part of the world?  This is when our annual visits to the area started.  Sometimes it was spring, sometimes summer.  Last year should have been Christmas in Cymru, but alas Covid put a stop to that.  This year with restrictions lifting and with people now able to stay over at people's houses or go on holiday we are taking our first tentative steps back to residential weekends.  Daniel recently sent out an email advertising the weekend and we currently have 4 definites and 1 maybe. Don't forget if you are wanting to go please email in by 14th August so we can confirm numbers.  Want to find out more about what we get up to in Snowdonia?http://mntv.blogspot.com/search/label/Snowdonia

Secondly, for those of you who have not yet been on a workday this year or if you have never been on one please see the below photo collage (also attached) to give yourselves an idea of the fun and work that we get up to on a workday.  If you have any photos of MNTV workdays you want to share then please send them in via email to info@mntv.org.uk

Thirdly, we have had an email from Chris at Formby with some information about Formby's upcoming woodland management plan.  He says "we've been working on it over the last six months and are really excited to start sharing with the community.  In collaboration with wildlife and woodland management experts such as Lancashire Wildlife Trust, Natural England and the Forestry Commission we've developed a plan which we are really proud of, focusing on benefits for both people and nature.  Over the month of August, we'll be running walks and talks in the woodland as well as community drop-in sessions at the Formby Library.  However, as one of our key stakeholders and interested parties, we would like to offer you guys the opportunity to learn more about the plan.  Ensuring that the community and stakeholders such as yourselves understand our ambitions, and the interventions we are proposing to take to achieve these, is incredibly important to us, so we would love to share this with you.

The key messages to be taken from our plan are the following:

- Focus on improving the health, species diversity and age structure of the woodland, to benefit priority wildlife species such as red squirrels

- Engage regularly with the local community about woodland management and improve educational opportunities for visitors

- Enhance areas adjacent to dune system by creating more space for dunes to roll back, and prevent suffocation of woodland edge

- Restore large parts of Ravenmeols to rare fixed dune grassland

- Improve accessible path network across woodlands

Attached is a short summary document about our plan for the next 10 years, but please do get in touch if you'd like to find out more about the specifics of what we want to achieve."

The document Chris mentions is attached above.  Please let me or one of the committee know if you would like to know more about the specifics so we can contact him.

Fourthly, we have also had an email that was sent in from MNTV member Jean that she received from Styal where she volunteers.  It's about the Green Recovery Challenge Fund, which I believe we helped with on the days when we planted trees on the Styal Estate when we started back at Styal earlier this year.

"Thanks to those of you that joined us for the walk and talks on the work being carried out through the Green Recovery Challenge Fund.  It was lovely to meet some of you.

Vicky has produced an update on the scope of the work that we thought it would be useful to share with you.

Please find it available to read here

Fifthly, we are still in the process of trying to get hold of Volunteer Cards (50-hour cards) and Long Service Awards so please bear with us whilst we try and find out where they are.

And finally, for those who worked at Hayfield on 18th July, Hayfield Volunteer Coordinator Debs Webster sent in the below:

"Our Ranger Martin asked me to pass on his thanks:

Hi Debs, I wanted to give a shout out to the Manchester Vols (MNTV) who came out to Nab Brow along the side of Kinder Res on Sunday 18^th.  What a bunch!  Was the hottest day of the year (at time of writing) and they were all determined to put in some hard work clearing the bracken from around the saplings and repairing the guards.  We made a big impact and some of the tiny oaks definitely appreciated it.  Plenty water and some lovely cakes at break time kept me going too.  National Trust parasols anyone?

Great bunch 10/10

Cheers,
Martin G"

A huge thank you from me too!  That is hard work and in the hot sun too.  That is proper dedication!!!

And that's it, nothing else from me apart from have fun and keep safe.

Ally

MNTV Program Planner