Category: Uncategorized

A fabulous day, sunny and warm! Thanks to all of you who came, all of you who helped and all of you who entertained us! We had an amazing turnout, with lots of lovely stalls, fantastic hospitality and wonderful music from Bernard Lee and the Duxford Saturday Workshop Jazz Band. There was a great talk from Ben from On the Verge and a nature walk and talk from Ashley Arbon M.B.E. our expert ecologist. Thanks to everyone! See the homepage for photos from the day.

Particular thanks to Pippa Heylings MP and Cllr Peter McDonald for supporting us, to Bustler’s Farm for providing the hay bales, to Duxford School for the parking, to Phil for providing first aid cover, to the Air Cadets for their effort and strength, to Adrian Powter for his wonderful photography, to the neighbours for providing power and water, and to Nick, Lewis, Barbara, Malcolm and Liz for help on the day and of course to the whole team, Sarah, Heather, Ian, Clare.

Follow us on Instagram and Facebook – search for “Duxfordgreen”

Our festival is fast approaching – gates open at 1pm on Saturday!

Fun for children, great stalls, and lots of experts to help you to help nature and some delicious hospitality to refresh you while you listen to music in the meadows.

Pippa Heylings MP will officially open the event at 2pm and then there will be a scything and pruning demonstration, children’s activities and a botany walk. Experts from the local Wildlife Trust and On the Verge will talk about their activities and you can sign up your garden to the Duxford Nature Network. In the evening, under a nearly full moon, you can stay for bat detecting and moth trapping.

Weather looks good!

Little ones can hear stories about the creatures that live behind the doors on the field, and come dressed as their favourite character. Bethany bee, Ellie the hawk moth, Nick the newt, Robbie rabbit, Harry hedgehog, Lucy the ladybird, Stan the Starling, Bluey the damselfly and Sonia the song-thrush. Hope to see you there!

Just beautiful!

Exciting news! The little-used petanque court is morphing into a base for a new art installation by a renowned local artist. The first piece has now arrived on site, with further sections being added over the coming months.

The sculptures are funded by the Duxford Parish Council Art Fund, which was set up from income derived from the Welch development in the village. This £10,000 fund has already enabled the Duxford Film Trail, the first Duxfest, and the beautiful wrought iron gates and the entrance to The Biggen.

Huge thanks to Welch Ltd., not only for generating the funds, but also for assistance in transporting the sculptures to the field.

We had a very productive day last week and made a huge difference to the Nectar Garden, weeding and mowing it. We also cleared a path up to the mound and cleared around a lot of the shrubs, that were disappearing into the meadow.

There is a beautiful pyramidal orchid at the base of the mound – we seem to get just one each year, always in a different place – maybe one year the field will be full of them! Many seeds have germinated on the new dry dip and our meadow is looking beautiful.

We will be on the field again tomorrow (2:30pm Tuesday 16th July), strimming around the bigger trees. The contractor will cut most of the meadow mid August, after the seeds have dropped or flown.

Sadly the ‘donated’ fish have eaten the many hundreds of tadpoles that we had in the spring -we didn’t even see one froglet! The fish are multiplying like crazy and now range from huge to very small fry, so in a couple of years we may well be in the same position as this Nottinghamshire village pond

If you want to fish them out and rehome them, please go ahead with our blessing!

FoDGS had a table yesterday at Duxday – we didn’t get any new members, but quite a few have now joined their gardens up to the Duxford Nature Network – we’re hoping to really roll out this programme this year and we’ll be pushing it at the Festival on 21st September. I hope soon create a web-page where you can add your garden automatically.

Know Your Nature: an immersive event celebrating the wonders of local wildlife.

Saturday 21st September 2 pm to 7 pm

Perfect for nature enthusiasts and families, an afternoon and evening of discovery and fun.

Discover Local Wildlife: Explore nature-based stalls where experts share insights on local flora and fauna. Learn about bird species, hidden mammals, and vibrant local plant life.

Fun for Kids: Children will be entertained by our interactive stalls, designed to make learning about nature fun and engaging. With these hands-on activities we hope to inspire a lifelong love of nature.

Culinary Delights: Enjoy delicious food and drinks from a variety of stalls.

Music in the Meadows: Relax on a blanket and enjoy the melodies. Fingers crossed!

Come to the Moth Ball: Experience overnight moth trapping with our experts and come back on Sunday morning to identify species caught during the night.

Limited pre-booked camping available overnight – £10 per tent – email info@friendsofduxfordgreenspaces.org

The blossom on the field this spring was beautiful, best year yet – our young trees are growing well, though we will need to remove most of the fruit from our orchard trees again this year to give them a chance to strengthen a bit more.

We’ve been busy in the last month, having got agreement at the FoDGS AGM to spend some money on more landscaping, we asked Hortiservices to remove a load of top soil from the top of the mound and create and seed a second dry dip. The maintenance contractor has mown areas of the site for picnickers this weekend, but will leave the meadow long for the summer. The new seeds have germinated and hopefully with the recent rain will now thrive.

A fox has recently been spotted on the mound and muntjac skat was seen today. We had hundreds of tadpoles, some of which will hopefully survive the hundreds of fish, from large carp to small fry, who seem to be multiplying daily. The heron tries his best, but the fish are canny and stay in the deep water – however the tadpoles are equally canny and stay in the super-shallow areas!

The meadow is looking great, the grasses are reducing, the yellow rattle has germinated and is now in flower (must remember to harvest the seed!) and the original dry dip is chock-full of pollinating plants, almost all self-seeded.

Hope to see you on the field – do stop and say hello if we are working – or better still, join us!

Yesterday I took delivery of our free tree from South Cambs District Council. I had the option of 6 smaller ones or one large one, so chose a large crab apple (Malus Everest). It arrived in great condition, even with some fruits remaining from the summer – and a price tag of £71 still on it, so all in all a really great offer – thanks to SCDC and the Woodland Trust who supplied it.

Ian and Sarah joined me today, and we planted the new tree on the Swale, next to the pond, together with 5 vigorous young willows that had been heeled into my back garden since last autumn.

The day was truly glorious, with a real feeling of spring in the air; the sparrow troupe were in full voice, chattering away as they flew up and down the hedgerow.

Having dug one too many holes, we decided to use it to create a log tower for stag beetles and half buried some of the cherry logs that had been piled up next to the hibernaculum. A shadier area might have been better, but we will allow the vegetation to grow up around it and create lots more of these habitats around the site.

Read more about stag beetles here: Build-a-log-pile-for-stag-beetles.pdf

Gosh I can’t believe my last blog was September! A dislocated elbow and a nasty chest infection have cost me about 3 months, and here we are with Christmas behind us and 2024 just around the corner.

The pond has thankfully filled up with all the rain, and has had 4 extra waterlilies added to it, which should cover more of the surface and reduce evaporation next summer. I just hope the unwelcome introduced goldfish haven’t eaten all our invertebrates!

In desperate need of some fresh air this week, I braved the wind with Barbara and Malcolm to replace the remaining guards on the trees. A lot of the trees have been nibbled quite badly since the guards were removed, and after all the time and effort we’ve spent on them, it seemed sensible to put them back on.

I added some yellow rattle seeds to a small area of the meadow – this little yellow plant weakens the grasses, allowing the meadow plants room to grow. Find out more about it here. We will also sow some areas of cornfield annual and native meadow mix in the spring.

The Nectar Garden is providing habitat and much needed food and shelter for our pollinators during the winter months. It it looks quite beautiful with its different seed heads and structures. Next year will be chock-full of flowers and pollinators.

Thank you so much to everyone who has given their time this year. Every hour makes a huge difference and Brewery Field just gets better and better. Thanks too, to the FoDGS members who fund what we do, even if you may not have time to help. Please consider joining us – it’s only £25 p.a for a family (£15 for singles).

If you can spare some time to help us in 2024, please do get in touch: https://friendsofduxfordgreenspaces.org/contact/

A very happy new year to all our friends and readers, gillian