Author: PeterBET

The 700th Anniversary of the Warren – excavating the Cottage

June 10th 2018 was the 700th anniversary of the forming of the rabbit warren on Backwell Hill. Sir Richard de Rodney was granted the right to free warren by King Edward II on 10th June 1318. The Warrener’s Cottage in Jubilee Stone wood dates back to the 1780s and was still lived in until at least 1843. See:  The Warrener’s Cottage

To mark this anniversary BET started to uncover the remains of the cottage walls, with guidance of Vince Russett, ex-North Somerset county archaeologist.

We hope that the excavation will give us some clues about how the warrener and his family might have lived and worked.  Already the inital clearance of soil from the walls is starting to transform the grassy mounds and to show the configuration of the old cottage. 

Just a few work mornings later and the cottage walls are clearly visible together with the side entrance and floor.

During the excavation we have found many fragments of pottery plus some unexpected relics.  These include what appear to be a wild boar tusk and two clay marbles from the late 1800s.

Our Anniversary Open Day was well attended and we were pleased to show lots of interested visitors around the site and our finds.

Follow the progress of the project in these galleries: Volunteers in Action 2018 and Volunteers in Action 2019.

September 2018:  We hope to excavate the interior of the cottage in 2019 or 2020.  In the meantime the tops of the exposed walls have been protected with lime mortar to prevent rain and frost damage.

May 2019:  We have been extending our excavation around the outside of the main walls. In the photo below, Mark can be seen working on the right side and has just found some new walls.  On the very left is the fabulous new curved dry stone wall our volunteers have built using some of the stone we have dug up. We are using more to rebuild the old garden wall.

July 2019:  We were amazed to uncover the foundations of an outbuilding on the right side. Old maps did not show this, but did have a small outbuilding at the back. We have uncovered a small section of wall behind the cottage which may be the start of this. 

August 2019: After digging deeper than we anticipated, the outhouse at the back is now clearly evident. The floor comprises stones set neatly on their edges and there is what was probably a stone work bench or table in the middle of the room. Even further back are yet more remains and the boundary wall which ran down to the lane.

With all these exciting finds, the project looks set to run for some time yet. We have written a plan for excavating the inside, which has been approved by the current county archaeologist.  Watch this space!

BET helps in Nailsea’s Nowhere Wood – April 2018 

On Tuesday 17th April six BET volunteers headed to Nowhere Wood in Nailsea to help the Friends of Trendlewood Park (FOTP). Some extra muscle power was needed for some serious path maintenance and construction work on the slope leading down to the old Pennant Sandstone quarry. This gently curving path was used to extract the quarried stone using ponies pulling tubs or “trendles”. In recent years the banks above the path had been damaged and the path covered in mud and debris.

FOTP, in conjunction with North Somerset Council, decided to re-profile the bank, dig out the path and concrete in a line of wooden bollards to retain any further falling soil.

So armed with mattocks and spades the BET volunteers ventured into Nowhere Wood to help the FOTP team. After a few minutes we unearthed a stone retaining wall which was previously invisible. Now uncovered, this has become an attractive feature along the path. The morning was spent removing fallen soil and clearing the path. After a break for a hearty lunch kindly provided by FOTP, we set about digging a trench and lining it with shuttering ready for concreting the bollards.

The bollards were fixed in place with quick-setting concrete which soon went off and the teams were able to stand back and admire their handiwork! The structure will be extended up the path in coming weeks.

The day was another great example of mutual support between member organisations in the North Somerset Nature Net.

More pictures of the day can be found in our photo gallery here:  Flickr Gallery.

There is also a short video here:  BET have fun with FOTP!

Scything Workshop at Chew – August 2017

On Saturday 19^th August, Backwell Environment Trust (BET) held a scything workshop at The Community Farm, Chew Magna. This free event was quickly taken up and, within a few days, all of the 25 available places were fully booked. The enthusiastic volunteers travelled from all over our area and some travelled as far as South Wales to come to this fabulous venue overlooking Chew Valley Lake.

Recently there has been an quite an upsurge in interest in traditional hand scything using Austrian scythes for cutting meadows in an environmentally friendly way. Austrian scythe blades are widely recognised as being amongst the best in the world and are imported into the UK from a factory first established in 1540.

The volunteers were taught the correct techniques for hand scything by BET’s Peter Speight and in a very short space of time were all scything away, cutting the grass at an astonishing rate.

After scything, the grass was raked up into piles and removed from the meadow using pitchforks – a very traditional English scene. After trying out the three different designs of scythe blade we had brought along, quite a few of the volunteers were keen to purchase their own scythes to use on their own patch of grassland when they returned home.

Lunch of delicious home-made soup and rolls was served from the Farm’s yurt and we all spent the lunchtime sitting in the glorious sunshine discussing the finer points of blades, snaths (scythe handles) and peening (restoring the blade’s profile).

We all finished the day tired, but I think everyone had a fantastic day, learnt some new skills, made some new friends and went away, hopefully inspired to carry on this ancient country craft on their own patch of land.

Ian Chambers

More pictures of the day can be found in our photo gallery here:  Flickr Gallery. 

Summer Walk – July 2017

With warm and sunny weather predicted for the BET and Friends of Trendlewood Park summer walk, the stage was set for a convivial afternoon mini-hike. However, because half the walkers were based in Backwell and half in Nailsea, plotting out where cars needed to be to ferry people to the start of the walk/return them at the end was no simple matter! Fortunately with the transport arrangements finally sorted out, we all converged on the BET Cabin for the 2pm start.

Our illustrious leader David Jones gave a quick team briefing to the 16 assembled hardy souls and described what pleasures awaited us on the terrain ahead. So off we set, initially wandering peacefully through the lush green ferns and rock outcrops of the shady ‘Fern Way’ before finally emerging into the warm sunshine and the fabulous sight of the BET wildflower meadows in full bloom. Walking at a slow pace, we reached the Badgers Wood viewpoint with its amazing panorama of the quarry, the Severn Estuary and the Welsh hills beyond. Then it was on to the Jubilee Stone with its equally stunning, but contrasting views of the lush countryside between Nailsea and Clevedon.

From the Stone it was then mercifully downhill all the way, passing some of our newly-restored wildflower meadows now alive with bees and butterflies, before finally leaving BET’s nature reserves to walk down to St Andrew’s Church.

Then onward, meandering lazily through slowly ripening wheat fields in the summer sun, heading surely and steadily towards Nailsea.

When we arrive at the Trendlewood Park meadows and woodlands, Pat Gilbert informs our ambling group about the Park and then leads us on a tour taking in the hidden gems of Nowhere Wood and their amazing seeded wildflower meadow project, to name but one.

With the long distance walk behind us now and the heat of the day starting to take its toll, the lure of a team de-brief in the Old Farmhouse Pub finally became too much for us and so we retired to the garden to wet our whistles and reflect on a very enjoyable afternoon stroll.  

Ian Chambers

After weeks of high winds and generally unfavourable ‘moth’ weather, our chosen night for our first moth trapping session in Badgers Wood was perfect – light winds, dry and warm. We set up in The Layers meadow close to the Cabin as it is superb for wild flowers and has the advantage that it is surrounded by woodland which gave us the chance a attracting as many species as possible. Myself and Colin Higgins (‘Higgy’ from YACWAG) started putting the moth trap together at around 9pm and then we waited for dusk to fall.

As it started to get dark, we saw five pipistrelle bats hunting for insects over the meadow and then heard some fox cubs screeching in the distance. The declining light then started to bring the moths out and we managed to catch a few before the trap was switched on at around 10pm. Higgy was using this particular battery-powered, ultraviolet led light moth trap for the first time, so he was just as keen as us to see how effective it was going to be. We left the meadow at around 10:30pm and Higgy bravely volunteered to return at daybreak to switch off the light and put the captured moths into the cool of the Cabin until the trap was opened at 9am.

When the trap was opened, the moths were carefully put into plastic containers so they could be more easily viewed and identified by the attending BET members. There are around 59 species of butterflies in the UK but approximately 2,500 species of moth, some with very variable colours, which made the identification of some species a little tricky!

Grey Arches

Mottled Beauty

Ghost Moth

After our close inspection, the moths were photographed and then released into the surrounding vegetation. In all, we added ten new species of moth to our species list and hope to follow up with more trapping sessions over the course of the summer.

Ian Chambers