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The Return of Nibbler

You may remember Nibbler the Gribble (see earlier March blog) - the extraordinary Pier-eating (that's pier-eating not pie-eating) crustacean so dear to our hearts and so very relevant to some of our current work in Yarmouth. Well, sadly he got squashed. But, our grief has been lessened by the arrival of the magnificent Nibbler 2 - a harder, tougher and more durable specimen all round. Thanks to Nigel George of Ecclestone George once again for his marvellous modelling skills. Nibbler 2 is off to Yarmouth Primary School to be painted and will live out the rest of his days as an educational icon and inspiration to the young people of the Island. The only thing is that, presumably as a response to the sad fate of its predecessor (see Rupert Sheldrake's theory of Morphic Resonance for the science behind this phenomenon) Nibbler 2 is now a lot fiercer and has to be kept in a sealed box at the moment. We're hoping he might mellow.

Sam snipping sofa

Our recently installed grass sofa at Merstone Station has had something of a growth spurt, so required a trim. Sam is pictured here using blunt shears to finish off what she started in more unusual fashion earlier in the day.... Recent dry weather has taken its toll on a couple of patches, but we hope to restart our watering programme soon to help things along. If you want to read more, and find out Sam's secret trimming technique, take a look at the Gift to Nature blog.

Wet Socks

Our Wetland Walk down near Sandown has always been one of the most popular of the Gift to Nature project sites, visited by thousands of locals and visitors alike each year. It's also a great place for hands-on conservation tasks and that's just what went on last week with the excellent Newchurch Scouts. Here you can see them stuffing new wetland plants into old socks pre-filled with stones before hurling them into the pond and watching them sink to the bottom. This is our patented method for hard-to-reach spots and it works a treat.

And here's a set ready to go:

The Scouts also made some excellent mining-bee homes:




All in all much good work was done for the Wetland Walk and Mother Nature and great fun had by all; and what would a Scout event be without something tribal too?

Sunshine Signs

The Sunshine Trail has been one of our most successful sustainable tourism projects (all congratulations to Becky Collier who dreamed up the concept). The 12 mile route is mostly off road, lots of it is fairly flat (though there are a few hills) and it passes through some beautiful countryside.

About a year in we added some new signs to make the route clearer, and today we did a little spring clean (though it felt rather more like summer!) of the signs, straightening the ones the little darlings had twisted round, adding an extra sign and replacing missing marker discs. We still have a couple more signs we would like to install, but need to find some funding! That's the biggest problem with so many projects, you can get the development funding, but try to go back and freshen it up, and there's nothing available. The local authority will rarely take anything over either, so we're left with doing the best we can on limited finances.

Dan at work installing new signs while I, errr... stood and watched....

Later in the year I'll be out counting and interviewing cyclists to try and gauge just how popular the route is, watch this space for more info.

Doorstep Medina

We've just done the first in the series of wildlife and heritage walks focusing on the Medina Valley from the Solent right up to Newport Quay. The overall project is called 'Medina Rediscovered' (funded by Heritage Lottery) and the walks bit 'Doorstep Medina'. There is also a schools programme making use of all the Medina's varied characteristics and features as local learning resources, plugging into as many bits of the curriculum as we can. The walk on Thursday went from Whippingham down to the river at Island Harbour and back again and what a splendid spring day it was! 2 Swallows, Orange Tips, Tortioseshells, Brimstones, Oystercatchers shouting all over the place, Great-crested Grebe and about a million Primroses. We went by St. Mildred's Church too where, in the graveyard, you can find Samuel Saunders and Uffa Fox, two absolutely extraordinary men who must have helped to make East Cowes the buzzing hub of engineering and design brilliance that it once was.
Being so close to them is kind of inspiring and makes you want to rush back and do something spectacular for the town. We love East Cowes.

All in the name of research

It is a common misconception that working in the Arts Team at I2k is "fun", "indulgent" and "not entirely serious". I think the accompanying pics from our recent research trip to the Tate Modern will amply dispell these untruths.

(from left: Kat slide, Jo slide)