SARUM U3A

Chairman Neil Russell welcomed attendees to the August Coffee Morning at St Francis Hall and gave advance notice of a nationwide U3A Photography Competition, the theme of which will be the coastline of Great Britain throughout the seasons. Winning photographs will appear in the U3A 2011 calendar. Formal rules and details are in the September issue of U3A News and on the website www.u3a.org.uk

Our guest speaker, biologist, teacher and Hillier Gardens Education Officer Mary South, gave an enthusiastic and comprehensive description of the activities of the Woodland Trust, the UK’s leading broadleaf woodland conservation charity. Its aims are to prevent further loss of ancient woodland, restore and improve woodland biodiversity, expand the area of new native woods and increase people's understanding and enjoyment of woods. The Trust with its 200,000 members has planted ten million trees to date, owns over 1000 woods open to all and is currently restoring or creating 100 woodland sites.

We learned that ancient woodland is home to more threatened species than any other habitat in UK, including over 50 types of butterfly. Half of the ancient broadleaved woodland that had survived until the 1930s has now been lost and 85% of our ancient woodland has no legal designation to protect it from threats; so the Trust relies heavily on lobbying by its members as one of its most important tasks.

More information on the valuable work of the Trust can be found at www.woodlandtrust.org.uk

The 16th September Coffee Morning will feature a talk by Jane Munro entitled “Fair Trade – Is It Important?”