Wormcasts

The Isle of Wight Land Care project (www.landcare.island2000.org.uk) set out its stall in the marquee at the IW Hedgelaying Competition on Saturday 24th February. All sorts of serious (but free) bits of paper were on offer to help farmers look after the soil and water on their land - titles like 'Ditch management' and 'Understanding buffer strips' were disappearing fast from the display tables.

Several people asked what the cute furry animal in one of the photos was - a water vole, still common here because there are no mink (as long as those ditches are properly managed).

Meanwhile the wet soil below me was sucking the heat from my feet. Only when I stood on the woodchips (put down to keep boots and mud apart) did they recover. A practical demonstration of the insulating power of mulch.

Outside, the hedgelaying competitors were doing a more public demonstration of a practical skill - the craft of keeping hedges in good condition for wildlife, livestock fencing, and of course soil conservation. There's more on hedges at the National Hedgelaying Society's website, www.hedgelaying.org.uk/.

But the best moment for me was when a young visitor pointed in excitement and correctly identified another photo - 'That's an earthworm!'
Charles Darwin wrote his last book about worms, and how they help to make soil - you can read it online at http://darwin-online.org.uk/EditorialIntroductions/Freeman_VegetableMouldandWorms.html.

Here's to the mighty earthworms. Long may they eat the soil.

Graffiti a go go!

We’ve got some new graffiti on the blue hoardings in East Cowes.

I know what you’re thinking… graffiti eh – the underground, often covert activity of youths in ‘hoodies’ and/or baseball caps?? Well scratch that, and please let’s not reinforce stereotypes at this early stage!

So, on Saturday 17th February we invited over a group of professional graffiti artists called Somnio (www.somnio.co.uk) to create a new painting on the blue boards. Somnio is an art collective which has been formed to bring together like-minded creatives. This piece can be seen in the Church Path area near the disused Bethel Church, which is adjacent to Well Road.

For those of you who don’t know, this was part of No Barriers (NB), an ongoing project run by the South East England Development Agency (SEEDA) and Island 2000 Trust. Over the past year or so we’ve been gradually turning the hoardings into an outside community gallery space for all to enjoy. See www.nobarriers.org.uk for details of the projects so far.

Lead by Duncan Newland and Stuart Bedford, the Somnio artists set to work early in the morning, bringing with them a vast array of sketches, designs, stencils, and err… paint! They worked on individual parts of the boards discussing and critiquing each others work along the way.

The resulting artwork displays figurative imagery with more decorative, organic forms, shapes, patterns and motifs. It also combines bold and graphic styles with looser, painterly techniques. The frame motif gives a feeling of continuity without controlling the individual artists’ styles. Hmmm, can you tell I used to work in art gallery?

The activities of the day created quite a stir along Church Path site – some people avoided it, and some embraced it, asking questions about what was going on. The general feedback was very positive indeed. Two girls were heard to say: “They’ve made it look really cool down here now.” That’s more like it!

We hope to do more work with Somnio in the future. And hope that this will open the door to other NB creative activities and artistic opportunities along the way.

Photography by Ian Boyd and Tim Johnson. See more of Tim's graffiti photos at: http://www.flickr.com/photos/64473370@N00/

ALVERSTONE REVISITED

I'm just now in the middle of a series of Feb/Mar talks ( funded by the Heritage Lottery) on the extraordinary archaeological find we made down in Alverstone in summer 05 and which still rumbles on, as mysterious as ever. We just wanted a nice wildlife pond - and we've got one now; but on the way the seemingly otherwise uninteresting little field chosen as the site revealed an unbelievable find: a massive cobbled Roman road underlain by six interlinked prehistoric (maybe Iron Age) timber causeways and overlain by later ones (maybe Saxon )! So, Alverstone, sleepy, tranquil, sedate and serene village of today was for hundreds of years, two thousand years and more ago, a bustling commercial and community centre. But why? There are even Roman military finds - amongst the Island's first. What was going on? Amongst the fins (see below) was a particularly curious carved stick - perhaps a wand, perhaps evidence of a long-standing ceremonial function that this point on the Yar provided to the people of the Island? The road looks as if it crossed the river - maybe this was the main crossing of the Eastern Yar at a time when Alverstone was at the head of the estuary? Peat and mud cores from the site down to seven metres show saltmarsh flora and diatoms at the right layers for this. It'll take at least another two years to properly unravel all this - so watch this space! in the meantime here are some pics : (http://www.britarch.ac.uk/communityarchaeology/wikka.php?wakka=HomePage ,for more info and other nice things from the Council for British Archaeology)

is this a ceremonial wand? spear cap and ballista bolt


beautiful axe-head the amazing cobbled road

Sandman Snowman

Spent the early afternoon helping build sandmen at Steephill Cove. We so rarely get snow on the Isle of Wight, that kids here seldom get to build snowmen, so we thought we'd try a variation on a theme! Everyone had great fun, and Dan even found time for a spot of sun bathing with his new sand-friend...

Poetry brings people onto the streets

As the organiser of Island 2000's poetry scheme, I'm pleased when members of the public get involved.

We recently ran a competition to write poems inspired by the Island's 1500 bus stops - the top 10 poems being cast in bronze and set into the ground at the relevant stops. Last week, the winners were announced in the County Press and on Solent T.V. I naively underestimated the impact this would have. This morning, cycling in to work, I noticed queues of people waiting expectantly at several East Cowes stops, clearly hoping to be among the first to set eyes on the poems.

I saw several Japanese tourists waiting near Osborne House, while 100 metres further down the road at The Swiss Cottage stop, a mother with three small children were camped out. Perhaps most heart-warmingly, a group of hooded youths had gathered at the bus stop by the East Cowes Town Hall, clearly high spirited in anticipation of the arrival of Margaret Prior's poem 'Useful Old Umbrella Tree'. Not wanting to dampen their spirits, I did feel duty-bound to let them know that the actual installation will probably not take place before April, but to my surprise, though they took the news with some incredulity, they remained steadfast, waiting by the bus stop. I returned to East Cowes town centre this afternoon to buy a sandwich and found that the youngsters, not taking any chances, had had the initiative to organise some sort of rota system and had been replaced by two pensioners. What enthusiasm! How nice to see young and old working together and to think that they have been brought together by poetry.

St. Bride’s Day

Today is St. Bride’s Day: Imbolc, the feast of Spring’s awakening. On this day Adders abandon their winter lairs and Oystercatchers appear bringing spring with them! Hooray! It still looks grey and miserable outside nonetheless; still, if it’s Imbolc then its Imbolc and that’s an end to it.

And in the spirit of all this we’re busy buying in assorted native flora for major planting projects down on the Lukely Brook (part of our urban river work) and out on the Medina where we’re creating a fab picnic spot at Merstone Station.

There’s loads more besides of course – have a look at the Feb newsletter and let us know if there’s anything that interests you.

Top of our list of new ventures is the investigation of peat wetland management (a big thing for us) as a local carbon sequestration/carbon offset scheme. Watch this space………….