Get Involved at Baysgarth House Museum

Barton on Humber’s Community, Heritage, Arts and Media Project (CHAMP) has been awarded a £50,000 grant from the Heritage Lottery Fund.

The grant will enable CHAMP to facilitate Get Involved! , an exciting new volunteering project at Baysgarth House Museum. Working in partnership with North Lincolnshire Museums Service, Voluntary Action North Lincolnshire, Jobcentre Plus and John Leggott College this unique project will encourage local people to become involved in museum volunteering.

‘We are delighted to have received this grant from the Heritage Lottery Fund’ said Neil Turner (CHAMP Chair) ‘Volunteering is a fantastic way to meet new people and learn new skills. Through the Get Involved! Project we hope to encourage people to join our volunteering team and become more involved in their local heritage.

The Get Involved! Project offers volunteers the chance to participate in a variety of museum based activities from collections care and research to greeting and guiding visitors through the museum. The project also offers training and support to help volunteers develop skills in range of different areas.

‘This is a fantastic new volunteering opportunity for North Lincolnshire, said Jacky Birkett of Voluntary Action North Lincolnshire. The Volunteer Centre and vinvolved team look forward to supporting the project by referring potential volunteers of all age groups, and offering additional support and guidance on volunteering matters to the CHAMP team

The project also seeks to encourage younger volunteers looking for experience to help them further their careers.

John Leggott College Careers Adviser Allison Peters said: “We’re delighted to be working with Baysgarth House Museum. The project will provide a great opportunity for our students to gain experience in museum activities and receive training in all areas of volunteering.”

‘The great thing about Get Involved! is that anyone can participate, said Louise Walker Volunteer Coordinator for the project. ‘If you are looking to meet new people, learn new skills or improve your career prospects we would love to hear from you. We welcome anyone no matter what your interests, time commitments or level of experience. You just need to be enthusiastic and willing to learn’

For more information email contact Baysgarth House Museum on 01652 637568 or visit our website at www.champltd.org

Barton Band triumph at Brass Band Championships!

I had the pleasure of accompanying the Barton Town Band to the North of England Championships in Darlington yesterday. The weather might not have been up to much, but that didn't dampen the spirits of the players who confidently stepped out on to the stage to delight the crowd with a staggering performance. I made a 2-minute film of the day, which is posted on the new Barton Blog YouTube page.

Congratulations to the band!!

http://www.youtube.com/BartonBlog

Found out more on the Barton Band facebook page

http://www.facebook.com/pages/Barton-Town-Band/292848025937?ref=ts

Star-studded trip to Sunderland for Baysgarth teacher and pupils

Thanks to Baysgarth school Year 11 student Sophie Elizabeth Bartup for these words and Patrick Sprakes, Head of IT at Baysgarth, for the images in this report.

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Trip to Sunderland

I had been asked if I would like to go to Sunderland with two other pupils from Baysgarth, by Mr Sprakes. When he told me I would get the chance to meet Darren Bent, a Premiership and England striker, I was very excited. Mr Sprakes was going to Sunderland for an expert master class on finishing by the Sunderland striker at the Academy of Light. Mr O'Mara, who plays for Baysgarth Old Boys, along with Mr Sprakes, had entered a competition with Lucozade for his team mate.

Outside the Stadium of Light, home of the Premiership football club Sunderland.

We arrived in Sunderland with time to spare, so we decided to visit the Stadium of Light, making the best out of our trip. We took some photographs and had a quick look inside. Then we headed to the Academy of Light. By this time, we could tell Mr Sprakes was getting nervous, after all he was going to be training with a Premiership striker.

We arrived at the Academy and waited in the conference room, Mr Sprakes feeling the nerves. When the time came, all the strikers from the competition went to get ready. We got the cameras ready to take photographs to show Mr O'Mara and then headed to the training pitches to watch our teacher and a Premiership striker.

As the action began, Darren Bent coached the strikers on finishing technique; all the players got to show what they were made of when coming one on one with England under 18 and 16 keepers; Mr Sprakes scored some top class strikes, which I'm sure even Bent would be proud of. When the master class finished, we asked Darren if he could sign the Baysgarth Old Boys shirt with the message 'To all at Baysgarth School'. Bent kindly spent time with us for pictures and signed his message to Baysgarth School.

Sophie and friends from Baysgarth with Sunderland and England striker, Darren Bent.

I enjoyed my day in Sunderland and visiting the Stadium and Academy was a great experience.

Sophie Elizabeth Bartup

Year 11

Baysgarth School

Pints and Paintings

It's not every day you get to unleash your artistic creativity in the back room of a pub and get served your favourite beverage at the same time. Well now there's a band of like-minded folk who head down to the Queen's pub every Wednesday evening to do just that, and with them they bring paint pots, brushes, canvasses and even a lab coat for potential Scotch-related accidents.

These are a relaxed group of friends who want to welcome others who are drawing or painting at home and feel like being a bit more social while enjoying their hobby.

Lizi Jones

Lizi Jones said, "We just like to have a random paint amongst like-minded people. There's no pressure. We have been coming here for a couple of months now and really would like some more people to come along".

Lizi's finished piece.

Eric Babbington said, "There's no teaching or anything like that. We just think there must be plenty of people stuck at home, young or old, painting on their own and we welcome anybody to join us and enjoy a relaxed and informal meeting place".

For more information call Eric on 07540 226987

Or email lizi_jonesy@hotmail.co.uk

The Woolly Workers of Far Ings

When you hear the term ‘conservation worker’ do you immediately think of earnest young people wearing hard hats, stout boots and wielding scrub cutters? Well, think again! Over at Far Ings you can see workers of a very different type who live out on the old meadows day and night whatever the weather. They make a fine sight clad in smart woolly coats with most sporting at least one natty pair of horns. No need for scrub cutters with this intrepid bunch, the only tools they use for tackling encroaching scrub are their very effective sets of teeth.

Lounging in the sunshine, until....

These Far Ings workers are, of course, Hebridean sheep - a small, hardy and long lived breed thought to be descended from sheep brought over by the Vikings when they settled the Western Isles and Highland regions of Scotland more than 1,000 years ago.

... the Shepherdess shook a bag of food and the group came thundering over at great speed!

An unusual characteristic of the breed is that many have multi horns maybe four but sometimes more and it was this attractive feature that probably saved them from extinction.

The breed was the mainstay of shepherds in the Highlands and Islands of Scotland prior to 1750 but gradually, after the Highland Clearances when families were forced from their homes to make way for large scale sheep farming, landowners replaced them with larger breeds such as the Blackface and Cheviot. By the mid twentieth century these Hebridean sheep only survived as ornamental animals in the parklands of a few large country estates and in 1973 they were identified by the Rare Breeds Survival Trust as a breed in danger of extinction.

However, all was not lost! Because of their hardiness and the fact that they thrive on vegetation too poor to be eaten by other breeds, Hebridean sheep are finding a new role in conservation. Their preference for grazing broadleaved vegetation such as dock makes them ideal for pasture improvement and for controlling the spread of invasive species and they can now be found on nature reserves all over Britain. The Lincolnshire Wildlife Trust itself has 500 of them spread all over the county with 24 currently at Far Ings in their winter quarters. These will soon be brought in and made ready to be sent out for summer grazing in other parts of Lincolnshire.

The sheep at Far Ings are used to stop scrub growing around the old clay pits as birds don’t like tall vegetation around the water bodies they use. They need a clear line of sight so that they can identify any predators. In other parts of Lincolnshire these sheep are used to restore low lying heathland and heather moorlands as, unlike other breeds, they prefer to eat the strong growing grass that smothers the heather rather than the heather itself. Over on the sand dunes and salt marshes of Spurn Point they are used to encourage a diverse plant life by preventing the regrowth of invasive sea buckthorn which would otherwise soon form a dense canopy.

Of course, you can’t have sheep without a shepherd! These sheep are cared for by Karen who has worked for the Lincolnshire Wildlife Trust for 17 years based at Far Ings. As well as caring for the sheep she does general conservation work all over the county, tasks such as maintaining footpaths and bird hides and leading group visits to the nature reserves. She started as a volunteer but has now graduated to become the full time assistant warden at Far Ings.

Norbet, enjoying a hearty treat.

As shepherd, her work involves feeding and monitoring the health of the sheep, worming, foot trimming and lambing although she was quick to point out that there will be no lambing at Far Ings this year. Even so, there is a flock of Hebridean sheep there all year round for you to visit and admire!