July 2013 Newsletter
Madam Chairman’s Piece
Colin Timmins recently stepped down as Chairman due to the weight of other commitments, and so I have taken on the role. I’m not too keen on ‘chairperson’ so let’s go with Madam Chairman! Colin has kindly offered to take the role of vice chairman to help me learn the ropes.
June heralded in some very welcome warm weather and I hope it is still with you as you read this!
Bernard Novell has kindly volunteered to design and maintain the website and the committee are very grateful for his kind offer. If you have any news, any links you think would be useful for other members, or anything you want to comment on the blog page, please do contact us.
We are also pulling together a potted history of WAGS to go on the website. Anyone who was involved in WAGS in the past and has any good stories to share, I would love to include them! Email them through or write them down and give them in at the store, addressed to me.
If you have any suggestions on any aspect covered by the Society, please tell me or one of the Committee, we welcome any new ideas.
Enjoy the Summer, let’s hope it’s a good one!
Sandra Halstead
Madam Chairman
June heralded in some very welcome warm weather and I hope it is still with you as you read this!
Bernard Novell has kindly volunteered to design and maintain the website and the committee are very grateful for his kind offer. If you have any news, any links you think would be useful for other members, or anything you want to comment on the blog page, please do contact us.
We are also pulling together a potted history of WAGS to go on the website. Anyone who was involved in WAGS in the past and has any good stories to share, I would love to include them! Email them through or write them down and give them in at the store, addressed to me.
If you have any suggestions on any aspect covered by the Society, please tell me or one of the Committee, we welcome any new ideas.
Enjoy the Summer, let’s hope it’s a good one!
Sandra Halstead
Madam Chairman
WAGS Autumn Show
Saturday 14th September 2.00-4.00 pm
Download the Show Schedule and Entry Form here
I’m writing this on the 2nd June and the weather has finally taken a turn for the warmer and everything in the garden and veg patch is trying to catch up on lost time.
Nearly all our judges are confirmed for the show, although I am looking for a backup to help Jean as Barbara is not sure she can make it, so if you know of anyone with good experience of baking and jam making who has an hour or two free on the 14th, please do let me know. It’s a lot of fun and no formal qualifications are required.
On the children’s classes, the theme this year is recycling, whilst the floral art classes commemorate a couple of centenaries.
Remember, if you won a trophy last year, please return it to the store and in clean condition, by Saturday 27th July.
I said this last year and I say it again, surely one or two of you reading this are willing to help out your WAGS committee and give me just an hour or two on the day to help out with teas and supporting the judges. Last year, not a soul. This year ???
So put the date in your diary, hopefully enter something and remember admission is free, the tea and cakes are yummy, and the exhibits are truly inspiring.
If you are thinking of entering for the first time and have any questions at all, however small, please do drop me an email or give me a call.
Sandra Halstead
Show Secretary
Download the Show Schedule and Entry Form here
I’m writing this on the 2nd June and the weather has finally taken a turn for the warmer and everything in the garden and veg patch is trying to catch up on lost time.
Nearly all our judges are confirmed for the show, although I am looking for a backup to help Jean as Barbara is not sure she can make it, so if you know of anyone with good experience of baking and jam making who has an hour or two free on the 14th, please do let me know. It’s a lot of fun and no formal qualifications are required.
On the children’s classes, the theme this year is recycling, whilst the floral art classes commemorate a couple of centenaries.
Remember, if you won a trophy last year, please return it to the store and in clean condition, by Saturday 27th July.
I said this last year and I say it again, surely one or two of you reading this are willing to help out your WAGS committee and give me just an hour or two on the day to help out with teas and supporting the judges. Last year, not a soul. This year ???
So put the date in your diary, hopefully enter something and remember admission is free, the tea and cakes are yummy, and the exhibits are truly inspiring.
If you are thinking of entering for the first time and have any questions at all, however small, please do drop me an email or give me a call.
Sandra Halstead
Show Secretary
Another Successful Spring Plant Sale
The Spring plant sale this May went very well and sales were up on last year, with both the vegetables and the bedding selling fast. As we saw last year, it is the vegetables that sell out first, so those of you who are keen vegetable growers please make a note to sow a few extra next Spring and bring them along.
Thank you for your support if you purchased anything, and a special thank you to those who grew plants to donate.
Please do remember to return the trays, so we will have something to grow next year’s plants in (you don’t have to wash them!).
The money made goes towards helping run WAGS, and in particular to cover some of the considerable costs of staging the Autumn Show. In total we raised £638, compared to £520 last year.
Thank you for your support if you purchased anything, and a special thank you to those who grew plants to donate.
Please do remember to return the trays, so we will have something to grow next year’s plants in (you don’t have to wash them!).
The money made goes towards helping run WAGS, and in particular to cover some of the considerable costs of staging the Autumn Show. In total we raised £638, compared to £520 last year.
Albert Reed
It is with regret that WAGS must let you know that we have recently 'lost' one of our staunchest members. Many members will have met Albert, either at the Store, at WAGS events, or at his Allotment; he passed away on Friday 26th April.
Albert was loved by all who knew him as a genuinely gentle, kind man who always had time to help others, particularly with anything to do with gardening.
The funeral took place at St Mary's Church, Wallingford on Friday 17th May.
Tool Sale: Albert's Sons, Dan and Neal held a sale of Albert’s gardening tools and other items at the Fir Tree Allotment on Sunday 2nd June. The sale was a huge success – they raised an amazing £505.10 on the day. They have added this to the £300 in funeral donations and shared it between the British Heart Foundation and the Stroke Association, as Albert’s chosen charities. Dan and Neal wish to thank everyone for their support.
Ghost Slug - read the full article here
This rare specimen turned up recently in a Wallingford garden. The ghost slug is a burrowing earthworm-predator is of special interest as it is “the only verified record […] from beyond South Wales and Bristol,” according to Dr Ben Rowson, Museum of Wales.
Where did it come from? Have you found one in your garden?
I live in a terraced house in the High Street, which has a tiny enclosed back garden with ridiculously high walls. We also have 2 kids and 2 guinea-pigs. Consequently I grow my bits and bobs in pots and get a bag of compost every year to mix in with my remnants and a dollop of manure. On the day I was going to plant things, it started to rain so I bunged the mix in all in the pots, stacked them up and left the planting up for later.
Then, a week or so later, I realised the slugs had found my only courgette plant so I dug it up and found a pot to replant it. I took out a hefty trowelful of compost mix and discovered a startlingly white slug which looked like it really shouldn't be out in the daylight. I quickly scooped it up and shoved it in my ‘slug pan’ (we are blessed with a lot of birds and I try to avoid pellets, besides which I find the 'capture and release' method very effective for exercising the Hubby of a weekend as he has to take them right down to the river).
A friend who knows a bit about these things suggested it might be a Ghost Slug - a burrowing earthworm predator. After a bit of internet searching I came up with a couple of websites - a BBC News article about newly identified species (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/wales/south_east/8072587.stm) and a website for a guy in Wales, Dr Ben Rowson (http://www.museumwales.ac.uk/en/rhagor/article/Ghost_Slug/), who was tracking ghost slugs following their appearance in the UK.
Dr Rowson’s site contains a downloadable PDF for identification and comments that another type of UK slug, the Shelled Slug, is also a predator of earthworms but is rare and doesn't appear to be causing any problems. This was reassuring! Although the site is a few years old, I sent him an email with the above photo (penny for size comparison) and he replied to the effect that it WAS a ghost slug and,"... the only verified record I have yet heard of from beyond South Wales and Bristol (others have been misidentifications or remain unverified). So this is an exciting (or troubling) find!" He also said that these slugs were very extensible and very elusive. So when I found one on the path next to the pan a day or so later, I just assumed it had escaped. Turns out I had two! I haven't seen any more to date.
Dr Rowson was keen to have the specimens for DNA analysis so they were duly dispatched to Cardiff in a marge tub full of compost. We think the most likely source of them was the compost -- possibly the manure -- but as I have to crumble that up by (gloved) hand I think I'd have noticed them. This isn't certain by any means -- they might have overwintered in the garden or come from a different source altogether, but the fact that there hasn't been a spread mapped from South Wales makes me think they aren't crawling under their own steam!
This means more may well turn up in the area and Dr Rowson is very interested in hearing about any that people might find. Ben will verify photos and ask for the postcode of any found for mapping purposes -- he might also ask for the specimen to see if they are related. He suggests people save the slug in a container of compost -- remember they live underground. How they got here we don't know -- whether it was via compost, and perhaps one of the ingredients was sourced from the Cardiff area, whether in the manure, whether they managed to crawl over a 12-foot wall topped with scabby ivy... it's impossible to say for sure. It will be interesting to see where the story goes.
Jennie Bispham