which helped to make RDNHS a healthy and vigorous society. Thanks were given to committee 

 members, recorders, providers of tea, Malcolm Storey for the production of The Naturalists. He 

 apologised should he have missed thanking anyone. 



2 October - European Mountain Flowers 

 Chris Bucke 



For his Presidential Address Chris Bucke chose to entertain the audience with a talk on European 

 Mountain Flowers illustrated with slides taken on many walking holidays in the Alps, Pyrenees, 

 mountains of central Spain and the Balkans. He began by stressing the relative paucity of the 

 mountain plants of Britain and moved rapidly to descriptions of the various richer habitats in the 

 mountains further south in Europe. There are many of them: scree, moraine, rock crevices, high 

 meadows and mountain pastures, also woodland. Plants have evolved to find their ecological 

 niches, determined by the availability of nutrients and, to a lesser extent, water. Slides of many 

 plants were projected, with some emphasis on the major families of alpine plants such as 

 campanulas, saxifrages, androsaces, gentians and the many members of the Asteraceae and the 

 Apiaceae. Some of the most spectacular slides showed the huge numbers of narcissi and 

 crocuses that bloom shortly after the snow has melted and the diversity of species that occur in 

 the high meadows and stabilised screes and moraines. Images of the occasional train, butterfly, 

 alpenhorn player and human crept into the talk to provide even more variety. 



16 October - Woodland Management: Blood Sweat and Tears, Is it all Worthwhile? 



Roger Dobbs 



Roger's talk covered the years of BBOWT's ownership of Bowdown Woods. 



Bowdown, which is part of Chamberhouse Woods, covers 55ha (135 acres) and has been continuous 

 woodland since 1600, making it a 'semi-natural ancient woodland', 98% of it has an SSSI designation. 

 Bowdown is on a steep slope (with the exception of the area known as the Paper Dump which is an old 

 gravel pit that had been filled with paper pulp). 



As with most woodland, Bowdown had been actively managed for centuries until the end of WWII. The 

 oldest individual trees are approximately 250 years old but some coppice stools, especially ash, are 500 

 years or more. An area of the reserve, known as the Bombsite, was an ammunition dump when 

 Greenham Common Airfield was in use. 



By 1983/4 the area was being reclaimed by nature with mature trees growing into woodland, scrub 

 encroaching on the Bombsite and the tree canopy closing over any clearings. BBOWT's objectives were 

 to increase the biodiversity, and to manage and create rides, clearings and heathland. Roger illustrated 

 the successes and difficulties that were faced over the years and the changes made to the management 

 of the site. Effective regrowth of coppiced areas was one of the early lessons to be tackled. This had to 

 include ways of keeping deer from eating the regrowth. Protecting stools via deadwood fences had 

 been ineffective; deer fences and the current method of protecting each stool are preferable. This work, 

 of course, relied in the main on volunteers. 



Apart from the initial period during which Manpower Services Commission funding allowed the 

 establishment of paths, drives and basic work, volunteer days have been a necessary part of the 

 conservation programme. Roger traced the number of days over the years; in recent times between 200 

 and 250 days per year are worked in the conservation of Bowdown. Some of these hours are provided 

 by BBOWT and its Conservation Trainees but the Friends of Bowdown, and the three volunteers who 

 work for the morning once a week provide a large part of these. Not included in those hours are those 

 spent by species recorders. 



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