Our main aim is to enhance the biodiversity of the green spaces in and around Loddiswell to improve them for wildlife and the enjoyment and well-being of the local community. We also provide hints and tips to encourage people to live more sustainably and to reduce their carbon footprints.
I have always had a passion for wildlife, my husband and I have done what we could over the years to conserve and encourage wildlife on our own patch of land. With the current climate emergency and the urgent need for action, just concentrating on a small area is not enough. We are members of the Devon Wildlife Trust's Avon Valley Project and this is an excellent example of how connectivity can be created over a large area by bringing smaller parcels of land together, like pieces in a giant jigsaw.
I am also a great believer in giving people hope: faced with the grim consequences of climate change, many of us wonder what we can do to make a difference and it's easy to feel powerless. But there are things that we can all do at home, which might seem small, but could really make a difference, especially if we work together. Inspired by seeing reports and photos from other parts of the country of roundabouts and roadside verges enhanced with wildflowers. I wondered if this was something we could emulate with the green spaces around Loddiswell (using locally harvested seed). Fiona Van Es had already pioneered this by sowing wildflowers on the verges opposite the new housing estate, where the hedge had been removed, and they look stunning in the early summer. I suggested extending this further around the village on the local Facebook group and was met with a very enthusiastic response . I felt that if we could form a group in Loddiswell that could work together to enhance the biodiversity of our green spaces, protect the local wildlife (we are privileged to have a plethora of this, much of it rare and endangered),encourage residents to make their gardens wildlife friendly and improve connectivity (create hedgehog highways etc.,) then collectively we could make an impact.. With other groups like ours springing up across the South Hams a ripple effect would be created and if this was repeated across the country then we would stand a real chance of making a difference. This I felt, would give people hope and motivation. By working together as a village community to improve connectivity we would also complement the work of the Avon Valley Project and work alongside it. Lynne Kenderdine has already given us much valuable advice and support, as well as donating seed collected from meadows within the Avon Valley.
Inspired by a project I saw on the Plantlife website “Restoring Shropshire's Verges” , I contacted Janet Cobb, one of the driving forces behind it and she gave me lots of information and encouragement (and here was a ripple already extending from Shropshire to Devon!) I then linked up with other like minded individuals in the village and Wild About Loddiswell was formed.
That was the easy part! If we were going to apply for any sort of funding, we would need a bank account. Our Parish Council, though supportive were not prepared to take us under their wing so this meant we would have to formalise the group with a committee and a constitution. Holding an AGM during a pandemic was a challenge, after postponing one date due to lockdown we resorted to holding the meeting on Zoom. Our biggest challenge at that point was persuading people to join the committee and bigger still to become officers. We had lots who wished to be part of the email group and to volunteer but anyone prepared to commit beyond that was hard to find. We managed to assemble a committee of eight and from that elected three officers. After much online research I had drafted a constitution and this was formally adopted at the AGM. We chose to be an unincorporated association which seemed to be the simplest and. most appropriate to our group. Over the following weeks we opened a bank account and took out insurance.
Our first project was to plant some trees on a piece of common ground on the edge of the village, the primary school children were involved with this too as they have their forest school there. To get the show on the road we decided to hold a launch event with a talk on bats given by Craig Dunton and Lynne Kenderdine from Devon Wildlife Trust spoke about the Avon Valley Project. I set up a Facebook group, website and wrote an article in the village magazine encouraging people to come along. We also invited people to join our email group to receive regular updates. At this point we also launched our campaign to save the old school field. This meadow had previously been the playing field for the school and is situated right in the heart of the village. A new school was built on the new housing estate on the outskirts of the village in 2018 and the field became redundant. Over the last five years the field has wilded itself beautifully. The tussocky grass is a valuable habitat for wildlife and hosts a wide diversity of wildflowers. There is a small copse (planted by village children) and the mixed native hedges around its edge are home to, amongst many other creatures, hazel dormice. Other rare species include slow worms and hedgehogs. A barn owl has been seen hunting there and rare bat species (greater and lesser horseshoe, grey long eared) have been recorded foraging over it. DCC submitted a planning application for 25 houses, which was fortunately rejected by SHDC. Wild About Loddiswell hope the field can be protected and kept as a green space for the village where we could plant a community orchard and create a nature reserve which would provide a quiet place for residents to enjoy and connect with nature. We conducted a small referendum and the vast majority of responses were in support of our proposals and against housing. Having just been warned another planning application for ten houses in imminent we will be ramping up our campaign and asking residents to sign petitions shortly.
