Some of the bats caught at Poole's Cavern during a recent survey by Derbyshire Bat Conservation Group.

Rather topically with Halloween just around the corner, we recently had a bat survey conducted in Poole’s Cavern by Derbyshire Bat Conservation Group. The group were hoping to record swarming activity. This involves of bats from a widespread geographic area, visiting an underground site and chasing each other in and around the entrance.
The reason why bats swarm during the autumn is not fully understood, but probably allows them to check out hibernation sites and bring males and females from a wide area together to enable mating opportunities and therefore increasing the genetic mixing between colonies.
Steve Roe, Events Manager for Derbyshire Bat Conservation Group explained that although no swarming activity had been recorded; all bats caught were male adults in breeding condition. Steve explained further that “Far more male bats are caught during swarming surveys and it may be possible that they were males checking out the site to see if any swarming was taking place or it could just be that they are using the cavern as a roosting site. It is probably a combination of both, however four species in a single night is still a great result and clearly the site is important for the local bat population.”

It is believed that the reason why more male bats tend to be found during the autumn swarming events is that once mated a female will no longer participate, where as the males will continue to swarm to increase the chance that their genes are selected by mating with more than one female.

In all ten bats were caught in total from four different species; 5 brown long-eared’s, 2 Daubenton’s, 2 Natterer’s, and 1 whiskered.

Our thanks to Derbyshire Bat Conservation Group for carrying out the survey and to Steve Roe for letting us use his photos.

CRISIS OF CIVIC ENGAGEMENT

CRISIS OF CIVIC ENGAGEMENT, SAYS GRIFF RHYS JONES
TV PRESENTER TO LAUNCH CIVIC MOVEMENT MANIFESTO 'LOCALISM FOR REAL'
Griff Rhys Jones, campaigner and Civic Voice President will claim that there is a crisis in civic engagement when he launches the manifesto of the civic movement at its annual convention in Canterbury on Friday 24 October.

Griff will say “We face a crisis of civic engagement. This is a symptom of the frustration people feel as power is taken away from communities and they are subject to tokenistic consultation. We need to give all citizens opportunities to actively shape the future of their place and to give communities the powers they need to enable their town and city centres to prosper”.

To achieve “Localism for Real”, the Civic Voice manifesto will be calling on future Government’s to:

• Make improving the quality of the public realm in our cities, towns and villages a priority
• Give all citizens opportunities to actively shape the future of their place
• Give local communities the powers they need to enable their town and city centres to prosper

Griff will add “If the Government is serious about Localism, they have to listen to the concerns coming forward from civic groups, resident associations and local councils. The Civic Movement agree with the Government that getting the economy moving is essential, but the myriad of proposals coming forward are clearly not the answer.”

Chair of Civic Voice, Freddie Gick said: ”We believe the manifesto, “Localism for Real” puts power back into the hands of communities. We look forward to debating this with politicians and communities over the next 6 months”.

The manifesto will be available to download from the Civic Voice website on Friday 24th October.

Peak District photographer,Phil Sproson,has produced a calendar of the Spa Town of Buxton for 2015. It encapsulates the architecturally significant town from its centre with some great views of the Crescent, the Devonshire Dome, Opera House, Old Hall Hotel and Pavilion Gardens and then outward to the surrounding countryside within a 10 minute drive. The calendar features locations such as the Cat & Fiddle, the Goyt Valley and Solomons Temple as well as a photograph of Poole's Cavern.

It is produced on high quality paper, and can be bought for £7.99 from the Poole's Cavern visitor centre.

Trevor Osborne addressed a public meeting at the Octagon in the Pavilion Gardens on Wednesday evening to present an update on the Crescent Project and to take questions from members of the public. Explaining that the project had suffered delay, in part because of the understandably complex negotiations with Nestle, to ensure that their rights to extract the water were protected during the restoration and building works. The matter was resolved with the granting of a £12m indemnity to Nestle in the event of any disruption to their supply.

Main Contractors have been chosen and now the enabling works have been completed the revised plans have been submitted to the council and a decision is expected on these by November.

Mr Osborne also explained that the restoration project had lost a vital part of its funding when Government decided to abolish East Midlands Development Agency, and replace it with Local Economic Partnerships. With the abolition of EMDA went some £5m in support which it has not been possible to replace.

On the day of the meeting Mr Osborne hosted a lunch to which English Heritage and a number of key partners in Buxton were invited.

Jonathan Davey a Director of Buxton Civic Association, who attended the meeting, commented that the response from English Heritage seemed positive. “We explained that the Crescent was important not only to Buxton, but was part of the heritage of Britain.” It is understood that English Heritage will consider whether any additional heritage lottery funding with be granted by the end of September. Key to their consideration of financial support is the heritage visitor attraction experience. The strategy for this, first developed in 2006, has been rethought. New consultants have been appointed and the proposal is to have the visitor attraction element managed by a charitable trust which in turn will be supported by a number of local organisations of which Buxton Civic Association will be one.

In addition to setting the crescent in its historical context with actors in period costumes and an 18th Century heritage bedroom as the centre piece of the public visitor experience, the story of Buxton water will also be explained. The intention is to create an interactive, historical experience for visitors to the crescent.

The Heritage lottery funding is critical to the continuation of the project, and assuming everything goes according to plan the restoration will create a 79 bedroom 5 star hotel, with 6 boutique shops. A roof top swimming pool is also proposed. The Spa will be open to residents of Buxton and guests of Buxton Hotels. It is expected that the project will be completed by 2017.

Alyson Philips did a fantastic job in organising a member’s social evening at such short notice after the Chapel en le Frith Civic Society had to cancel our trip to them, last Thursday. As well as the chance to enjoy Alyson’s baking, Members were given a sneak preview of the panoramic photographs from Solomon’s temple that Lyn Noble has been preparing. It is hoped that these will go on sale at the visitor's centre in the near future. There were some interesting discussions about the future of the market amongst other things. A big thank you to all those members who supported the event. We are looking forward to the next one already.

In the next month or so Alan Walker and the BCA woodland volunteers will be out and about working on the Woodland Glades, in Grin Low,. giving them their all important annual cut back. These beautiful wild flower glades, that we have created and work hard to preserve and maintain, are becoming all the more important in the light of the recent news about the loss of much of our remaining wild flower meadows to intensive farming.

The woodland glade areas are associated with the 17th & 18th century lime burning industry on the hillside. Below each kiln is a wide area where waste limestone ash was tipped. Slowly the lime tips were colonised by lime loving species of herbaceous plants and grasses such as Northern Marsh Orchid, Burnet Saxifrage, Globe flower, Mountain Everlasting, Creeping willow and Juniper creating a unique habitat which unlike the neighbouring farm land is not grazed or fertilized by animal livestock.

The area of Grin Low was designated by the Nature Conservancy Council (now Natural England) as a site of Special Scientific Interest in 1983 recognising the Juniper as the only surviving example in Derbyshire and was re-designated by Natural England in 1981 under the Wildlife and Countryside act.

With continuing advice from Natural England it was recognised over 15 years ago that without careful management the glades would be encroached by rank species of grasses and invasive trees species such as Birch and Ash and these valuable areas could be lost.

Since then a project which was originally funded by Natural England has seen the glades annually cut using power brush cutters and the cuttings raked and removed from the glade. This is important to prevent the thin soil layer from becoming too enriched and therefore able to support invasive species.

This is a highly labour intensive time and the BCA woodland volunteer group are invaluable in assisting with the grass clearing and cutting back saplings on the glade edges.

We have now bought back eight or so glades to good condition which total around 7 acres of the 100 acres of Grin Low wood and hope to enlarge some of these areas further. Sadly funding is not currently available for this project which makes the need for volunteer help even more important so if anyone has a few hours to spare anytime in September and October please contact Alan at Poole’s Cavern visitor centre on 01298 26978.

June Noble has produced an excellent guide to the Wild Flowers of Grin Low accompanied by some wonderful photographs by Lyn. The Guide is available from Poole's Cavern Visitor Centre for £3.00.

Below is the text of a press release received today from Nestles public affairs consultants concerning the appointment of a new developer for its former bottling plant site in Station Road, Buxton.

Once the developers have their proposals ready, a special meeting will be arranged with the developers and members of the Buxton Civic Association.

PRESS RELEASE
Tuesday, 26 August 2014


NEW DEVELOPER APPOINTED FOR NESTLE WATERS’ BUXTON SITE

Nestle Waters has selected a new partner, Cheshire-based developer Consolidated Property Group (CPG), to develop its former bottling site in Station Road, Buxton.
Based in Alderley Edge, CPG has gone back to the drawing board with the site and held extensive discussions with adjoining landowners Network Rail, DB Schenker and Peak Rail, as well as pre-application discussions with High Peak Borough Council. CPG is proposing a mixed-use scheme including restaurants, small shops and an 80 bed budget hotel alongside a single storey foodstore - smaller than that previously proposed. The new plans will also include improved car parking and access for rail users and better pedestrian integration with the adjoining rail station and the town centre.
CPG’s spokesperson, Dan Bramwell, said: “We are proposing a high quality mixed-use scheme that will integrate with Buxton’s core retail area and complement the town’s existing architecture. The site offers a good opportunity to create better linkage across the area, especially with the rail station, whilst also introducing a range of complementary non-retail uses in the town centre. The scheme will create approximately 345 jobs and a further 50 during construction in a capital investment in Buxton of over £35 million.”
“There is no named operator for the foodstore but one of the key design principles is that we have reduced the size of the foodstore from any previous proposals and have included some smaller shop and restaurant units. There is a need to ensure that any scheme is not only realistically deliverable but is also financially viable and a foodstore is a key ingredient for the latter.”
 

A formal consultation programme will begin in the near future with a public consultation display in September, the details of which will be announced early next month. It is anticipated that a planning application will be submitted by the end of September.
ENDS

Butterfly theatre is a familiar name to anyone who has been around for previous Buxton Fringes. For the last four years, they have graced Poole's Cavern with their performances of some of Shakespeare's most famous plays - A Midsummer Night's Dream is the one most people seem to recall - but this year they went in a slightly different direction. The new script 'Dracula's Women Underground' drew in large audiences each night, managing to attract both Fringe newcomers and long-time fans.

Written for the cave setting, it told the story of Mina, Dr Seward, Van Helsing, and Renfield, attempting to track down Dracula after Lucy's death, but instead encountering his three vengeful brides. Each character was pleasingly true to their portrayal in the book, and while some artistic liberties were taken with the script, it set up an intricate adventure through the cave and back as the audience followed the vampire hunters on their quest. The actors put the space to great use, crawling under the bridge, and scrabbling up the sides of the river bed. The cave made a wonderfully spooky setting for such an iconic, Gothic book, bathed in red light and full of mist.

As is always the case for Butterfly the acting was faultless, since the actors allowed the script to flow freely on each performance and made slight adjustments for what fitted well at the time. Given the company's success at past Fringes, we should be lucky enough to have them back in the cavern next year, either for another adventure with the Bard, or something a little more mad........

Some quick thinking by a party of visitors out walking near the edge of the woods saw them intervene and stop Vernie the Rottweiler from chasing sheep. They managed to catch Vernie, and attach some string to her collar before bringing her down to the visitors centre at Poole's Cavern. Thirsty after all her running around she proceeded to drink vast quantities of water, and eat handfuls of treats. In the meantime Paula Pickering, who manages the Cafe at the Cavern, thought that she recognised Vernie, so she was taken to Overdale vets where a quick scan revealed that she was chipped. In the meantime Vernie's owners dropped in to the visitor centre looking for her. So they were able to rush down to Overdale vets to be reunited. A happy ending for all concerned.

It was a perfect sunny summers Sunday afternoon, ideal for the guided walk through the wild flower glades of Grin Low, led by June Noble and ably supported by husband Lyn for members of the Buxton Civic Association.

The woodland glade areas in Grin Low, are associated with the 17th & 18th century lime burning industry that used to dominate the hillside. Below each kiln is a wide area where waste limestone ash was tipped. Slowly the lime tips were colonised by Lime loving species of herbaceous plants and grasses such as Northern Marsh Orchid, Burnet Saxifrage, Globe flower, Mountain Everlasting, Creeping willow and Juniper creating a unique habitat which unlike the neighbouring farm land is not grazed or fertilized by animal livestock.

As well as being able to see a wide range of species, June gave members tips on wild flower identification and spoke about the importance of the glades, explaining how the management of the glades by giving them an annual cut using power brush cutters and the cuttings raked and removed from the glade, is vital in preventing the thin soil layer from becoming too enriched and therefore able to support invasive species.

Lyn and June have produced an excellent introductory guide to "The Wild Flowers of Grin Low Country Park" which is available from Poole's Cavern Visitor Centre.