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Meadow Workshops with Carymoor Environmental Trust

Being part of a community group can be very enjoyable and rewarding but it can also be hard! Wilder Communities Officer, Guy Braga tells us more.

As many will know reading this, being part of a community group can be very enjoyable and rewarding but it can also be hard, especially if there are only a few of you and trying to cover many aspects from running the group to organising and running activities and in many cases also being responsible for the subsequent management of open spaces, often requiring very specific knowledge and practical skills.

South Somerset Environmental Forum (SSEF) is a network for community groups in South Somerset who get together on a regular basis to share experiences, discuss opportunities for working together and learning from each other.

It was during one of these meetings that it became clear that there were a lot of individuals involved in some way with wildflower meadow creation and management. It was also clear that some additional learning would be really helpful - with and with the possibility of then being able to better use that shared knowledge to help each other with their own respective actions with meadow management.

Beth Calverley Poetry Machine

To help capture the essence of what people thought and felt about meadows, we also invited Beth Calverley of The Poetry Machine to attend. In this setting, The Poetry Machine becomes an imaginative place-making consultation method that gathers community members’ thoughts, feelings and ideas, while nurturing them with a meaningful moment of mutual listening!

Beth took notes of people's words and reactions throughout the meeting and then, at the end of the day, turned them into a poem, which you can read below.

'Right in at the Grassroots' a poem by Beth Calverley

Carymoor was a landfill. Now it’s a place to ask questions.
What was the history of your site? What are you trying to achieve?

Our group hasn’t got a name, but we have got 80 people planting trees.
We’ve got 26 different plant species. Last week, 100 plugs, countless seeds. 

Are you surrounded by luminous arable or nature reserves?
Make a plan. Embrace mixed success. Grasses take time to learn.

I’ll start small. A bed the size of a mattress. See what springs free.
I won’t expect miracles. Just joy (and hopefully betony).

On nutrient-rich land, cut early. Leave some areas uncut. 
Top it 4 times a year. Change it next year. Mix it up. 

We’re all very green. We want to start out right. I do it to help wildlife survive. 
Adders, badgers, foxes, voles, dormice. The pole cat who works the hedge.

Always cut from the middle. Encourage the animals to the edge.
You’ll be thanked by fleabane, birds foot trefoil, hoary ragwort, knapweed.

When I gardened for myself, I’d put plants in pots and forget.
Now, I remember to water. The wildlife depend on me.

Red bartsia for the shrill carder. Devil’s bit scabious for the marsh fritillary.
Jacksnipes are quicker than a power scythe.

My wife and I wanted to stay active when we retired -
meet people with similar interests, not frightened to give it a try.

Don’t be afraid to chop wildflowers in May/June. Tough love.
They’ll return in late Summer/early Autumn and thrive.

One day, the public will marvel at a mess, find beauty in the rough.
Local people will walk our bit of land, see owls hunting in the scrub.

There’s something lovely about a team of scything volunteers.
That traditional festival atmosphere. 

I do it because a lot of people aren’t. Because I remember meadows.
On my paper round, I’d get off my push bike, lie in the flowers, look at the sky.

At the same time, there’s only so much raking you can ask volunteers to do. 
Only so much tea and coffee you can use as bribes!

I had a mulberry tree as a child.
I was very popular - I’d take the silkworms into school. 

Keep going! If it doesn’t work, try something new.
At Carymoor, we’re learning too. Maybe kidney vetch will tempt the Small Blue.

That’s why it’s good to see children involved again -
that germination. Right in at the grassroots.

 

Right in at the Grassroots was created by Beth Calverley, incorporating words of South Somerset Environmental Forum members on a tour of Carymoor.

In an effort to help SSEF members, as part of our 30x30 project funded by the National Lottery Heritage Fund (NLHF) we were able to fund two Meadow Workshop days - put together specifically for them and run by Carymoor Environmental Trust's Community Ranger, Neil Gemmell, at their Environmental Centre near Castle Cary.

Over the past 29 years Carymoor Environmental Trust has transformed 80 acres of a capped landfill site into an incredible nature reserve with meadows, woodland and wetlands.

The first Meadows Workshop day was about different types of meadow and their own unique management requirements to maximise benefits to wildlife and sustaining the quality of the meadow type. 

The second workshop focused on the practical task elements of meadow management. SSEF members learned about different wildflower seed and sowing rates and how to grow seed on into more established plug plants. 

Meadow workshop taking place

Image: Guy Braga

Planting plug plant wildflowers. Image: Guy Braga

Planting plug plant wildflowers. Image: Guy Braga

Both days were really enjoyable and informative and I hope will enable SSEF members to be able to not only help their own groups with meadow creation and management, but also share that learning and task management with others
Guy Braga
Wilder Communities Officer, Somerset Wildlife Trust

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