Coetir Anian - Cambrian Wildwood

Spring weather in Wales, and across Britain, this year broke some records, with the coldest April on record followed by the wettest May. Fortunately, by the end of May we had some fine, sunny weather going into June. Meanwhile the pandemic restrictions are being gradually eased, giving us the opportunity to resume some of our group activities.

The wild horses came through winter maintaining good condition, and two foals were born in the spring.

On site, we continued to plant trees during April adapting the ‘no fence planting’ techniques of Steve Watson in Snowdonia. For more detail on these techniques, see our website articles Sabre Planting with the Tree Shepherd and No Fence Tree Planting. We have now used up the limited amount of steep ground and existing vegetation cover that these methods require. So we are relying on our observations of where the large herbivores favour for grazing and where they seem to avoid, and planting trees where we think they will be safe due to difficulty of access and poor grazing quality. Thorn shrubs are very effective cover for other tree species to grow amongst and be safe from browsing, and this is frequently seen in nature and used in no fence planting. To increase future opportunities for this, we have been planting hawthorn this season, in areas where we want to have more trees in future, including parts of the site remote from exisiting trees.

The education programmes were able to get back into action during June. Before this there was a lot of organising to do to make sure that the pandemic measures were being followed and to find groups able to come on site. Three of our partner Primary Schools (ages 4-11) sent along groups of twenty of their older children to continue with their programmes on site. These groups spent the day learning how to make fire, foraging for wild food, and cooking on a camp fire. We found that many of the children are suffering from anxiety due to the experience of the pandemic, and they needed a lot of encouragement. Schools are still not able to send kids on residential activities, so we offered the Youth Camps to teenagers through other contacts. One group is made up of teenagers in care and foster homes: unfortunately at the last minute this was cancelled due to issues with the partner organisation. However we have established a good partnership with them and this will certainly go ahead in future. The other group is made up of young carers, and this camp went ahead during the week beginning 28 June. As ever, the experience of camping in the wilds and learning traditional and life skills was very profund for the youngsters. Some of the behavioural challenges they presented reflect the immense pressure felt by all carers during the pandemic, but more so for these teenagers. We are planning a series of day sessions and camps with two new partners, addiction recovery orgnisations: we expect the experience of spending time in wild nature will be a significant element in the recovery process of their clients.

Monitoring of the impact of the project is important. We get feedback from our beneficiaries and their mentors. For the habitats, we use vegetation surveys and photography to gain insights into how the site is evolving. We have 500 fixed point photos taken during the first two years of the project, which provide valuable baseline record. These are all referenced to fixed points by GPS and have now been catalogued. A new development is a partnership with Aberystwyth University who are linking our data to on online mapping system as part of their Living Wales project.

Our Open Day was held on 5^th June and was linked to the launch of United Nations Decade on Ecosystem Restoration 2021-2030. We are a partner organisation for this initiative and aim to play the fullest part that we can by restoring habitats over a larger area and increasing the abundance of wildlife. The event also saw the official inauguration of our new shed by Jane Davidson, fomrer environment minister of Welsh Government. We are now offering corporate partnerships to suitable businesses as a source of income for our work and to enable responsible companies to partner with an intiative that is making positive differences on the ground. We have also changed our donation platform focus from backing land purchase to backing the project activities. Existing donations will be held in the Land Fund, but new donations will now go into project costs. This change will continue until land becomes available to purchase and while support is required for our activities.

Links:

• Project website
• Living Wales project
• UN Decade on Ecosystem Restoration

Thank you for your valued support for Cambrian Wildwood.

The project has been developing rapidly, with the purchase of the 350 acre site Bwlch Corog in 2017 and the award of project funding from Welsh Government later that year, with the money coming through in 2019. We began activities during 2018 with some volunteer work days and school sessions. We now have three full-time staff delivering the project on behalf of our trustees and all supporters and beneficiaries.

We have written a series of news items and articles on our website to give some detail of our habitat restoration and educational work. Below you will find excerpts with links to the full news items and articles on the website: click/tap on the title to follow link.

Horses at Cambrian Wildwood

The semi-wild herd of horses at the wildwood are part of the landscape. Insights into the decisions to introduce these herbivores, their role in the project and their story so far.

Bog Restoration

A major piece of habitat restoration work to reinstate blanket bog and wet heath at Cambrian Wildwood. A fascinating account of the skilled work which took about 6 months to complete.

No Fence Tree Planting

Restoration of tree cover at Cambrian Wildwood is being assisted by introducing low numbers of trees across the site using various No Fence Tree Planting strategies. The methods were pioneered by Steve Watson in North Wales.

Schools Visit Cambrian Wildwood

Education is a fundamental aspect of the project and a core part of this is getting kids out into wild nature at Bwlch Corog, working in partnership with local Primary Schools. This is an account of their experiences and the importance of this work.

Primary Schools Creative Project

The project works with groups of Primary School children for three years, including sessions in school. Creativity is a big part of this, connecting to nature themes discovered on the site visits. The article includes a link to a video about this Creative Project.

Youth Camps at Cambrian Wildwood

The Youth Camps are a unique opportunity for teenagers, with the project working in partnership with Secondary Schools in Mid Wales. On each camp, a select group of 10 youngsters spend 5 days camping on site and learning skills to live in the wild. Feedback from the camps was uplifting.

Supporting Children and Young People during the pandemic

With the in-school sessions and site visits and youth camps all cancelled from April 2020, Cambrian Wildwood came up with other ways of supporting children and young people. Early in the year Clarissa our Education Specialist sent out a Nature Challenge each week to our partner schools. In autumn the Nature Arts Drop came to fruition.

Going Back – Can our society return to a sustainable economy?

Another article in our series looking into human relationships with nature. Our civilisation is lost. Our ancestors and tribal people today can help us find our way back to a sustainable path.

with best wishes from Nia, Clarissa and Simon

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