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 Why not become a member of Bath City Farm? If you would like to receive a copy of our all singing, all dancing newsletter, in glorious colour and with pictures, please consider becoming a member of Bath City Farm. Membership only costs £8 a year (concessions available). Your membership fee helps to support our running costs, e.g. salaries, site work, newsletter and of course our animals. Big Summer fundraiser This years Big Summer Fundraiser was held on 27th August Bank Holiday Monday. We are absolutely delighted to have raised £1300. This is the most ever raised from one of our fun days. Hooray. About 200 people came along and it was a beautiful day with plenty of attractions for all ages. Local Band Pandora’s Box and a young very talented folk singer provided live music and The Royal Oak on Lower Bristol Road provided the Real Ale and Wine to get everyone in the mood. There was also a BBQ, Teas and coffees, a car boot sale, bouncy castle, face painting and much more to keep people happy. One of the best fundraisers was the Raffle and Bottle stall organised by Trustee’s Sarah and Trish. Some great prizes were donated (please see list on back page) and lots of kind people donated bottles. Everyone put in such a great show this year and helped to make it such a great success, thanks to all of you. Unfortunately we didn’t manage to take any photos of the event, as we were all too busy running stalls, but take it from us it was a brilliant day with lots of happy faces. Time Bank Fun Day Organised in partnership with Time bank Plus this event was held on Wednesday the 8th of August. It was the busiest day of the year with an estimate of over 300 people attending. It coincided with the regular family days and Bath Area Play Project also ran their mad science event here. We raised over £400 to be split between the farm and the Time banks. Time banks brought along music, refreshments and a Fire engine also came to visit which proved very popular. The many attractions included Tarot card reading, massages, children’s crafts, splat the rat, bouncy castle, fruit bug making and even chicken racing! All stalls were run by brilliant volunteers, who boiled sitting out in the hot sun. Goodbye to Sarah Bird who has now left the Time bank, she did a great job getting it off the ground. Summer Family Day Once again, it was a cracking summer for family days here at the farm. We joined forces again with First Steps Nursery and Southside Family Project to give parents, carers and kids fun stuff to do every Wednesday during August. The fruitbugs were back by popular demand, with kids and parents alike snacking on the modelling materials. Weird creatures were built out of fruit and demolished by hungry kids (and chickens and goats) afterwards. Kids had a go at making Superhero Sock Puppets, giving the finished characters voices and superpowers. The kids also entertained us all with their ‘Wacky Races’ antics, with ‘run like a spider’ and ‘run like a pig’ races working off all of that spare energy. Mums were treated to pampering by Tina Hunt and Tanya under a gazebo with far-reaching views. The Play Rangers were off-site this year, but could be found down in Rosewarn Park doing sporty things. Goodbye Steff and Abby After careful consideration Steff Reynolds has handed in her notice to leave the post of Community & Education Manager. “I am really sad to be leaving the Farm,” she said. “I have really enjoyed my time meeting local families, working with the schools, and especially helping out at school holiday events. Thanks to everyone for making my work so easy. I really will miss you all.” Sadly, the post of Community & Education Manager is coming to an end here at the farm. A lack of funds means that the Farm has had to make the difficult decision of deleting the post, freeing up much-needed cash to help with the upkeep of the farm site and its animals. “It’s a bit of a blow to lose this post but necessary for the farm to be able to continue,” says Abby, current Community & Education Manager. “Working here has been a pleasure, and I will be sad to go. Thanks to everyone involved for having me.” Education and Schools News You’d think that schools would stop coming to visit during the summer holidays, wouldn’t you? Well, you’d be wrong, because Springmead School Summer Holiday activity club came to meet the animals and explore the farm, bringing twelve students who had not visited before. The young goat kids were a hit. They seem to recognise fellow kid-humans, and make a beeline towards them and start playing games. Dudley the Duck was in fine form, and even let the children pick her up and smooth her feathers. We now have three schools enjoying regular sessions at the farm. Three Ways and the Link special schools have returned this autumn, with new students to enjoy the farm educational programme, and Hayesfield Secondary school have taken up the challenge of tackling some farm projects, with the first being to take charge of our soft fruit bed and main building outside reception area. There have been few takers for the Farm skills pre-college taster course, which we had decided to launch in the spring. Recently Norton Radstock College was interested in sending us potential students who could go on to do a course at Entry Level at Norton Radstock. It is looking doubtful that the farm will be able to run the course, so sadly plans may have to be shelved. Thanks and apologies to everyone out there who was interested in attending. We will keep you posted if there is any good news. All this is changing soon, with the end of the Community & Education post. It will still be possible to come and visit. Please ring Helen for details on 01225 481 269. Animal Update This summer has been very busy on the animal front, we have had Jimmy the Tamworth boar up from St James city farm, he has been put in with our resident Tamworth pig Molly, fingers crossed that she is now pregnant. Her gestation period is 3 months 3 weeks and 3 days and she should be having the piglets end of December/early January. It was love at first site with the pigs as Molly let Jimmy eat all her food and push her about, but now she is pushing him around and eating all his food. We have had to separate them again as she is so grumpy with him. Jimmy will be leaving us soon, he would have gone back earlier but as the foot and mouth restrictions came in we had him for another few months. It will be sad to see him go. Ashley our British Saanen goat has given birth to two lovely babies, Kasmir the male and Katie the female, the father of the two is Kish an old English breed of goat who we borrowed from a farm in Somerset. When they were born they had trouble suckling as Ashley’s udders were very full with milk and they dragged on the floor. We had to milk Ashley and bottle-feed the babies till they were old enough to get at her teats. This made them very tame and the toddlers at the Roots and Shoots Club had a great time playing with them as they jump on your lap and run riot. As they have got older we have let them out into the big field they have had a great time meeting the sheep and our other goats Honey and Chalky. Honey plays with the babies giving them gentle head butts but Chalky the grumpy old man gives them a large bash with his horns.! Our Soay sheep lambs have grown up and they will be ready to go for meat in October, we have clipped their feet and tagged their ears and now they look the part. Bart, our extra tame sheep was very ill with fly strike and he was a not able to stand as he was so ill, the vet was quickly called otherwise if left it could have been fatal. He had to be shaved on his back so he does look a sorry site but he is much better and is getting back to be himself again. Written by Liz Doughty, Work experience student. Volunteer Update We have had some fantastic Team Building days over the Summer and Autumn months. B&NES Adult Care team (Social Services) chose the farm for their team away day. They built a lovely wood-chipped path around the garden, extended the garden and planted some plants. They contributed £210 towards the materials and all worked really hard. The Cub Scouts and Bath Mind did preparation work on the path before the group came, so it was a real community effort. The Environment Agency also leant 30 bodies to the farm for the day. They built a wood-chipped path alongside the pig pens, cleared the wildflower meadow area, weeded and mulched the soft fruit bed and did other small jobs. They contributed £105 towards materials and left us some great brand new tools. Again all worked really hard. Our most recent team building day was Price Waterhouse Coopers. They spent 2 hours working on the garden and bought £250 worth of beautiful plants. They were put in touch with us through the Time Banks for which we are very grateful. The Roots and Shoots parent and toddler group have also planted some plants and bulbs. The garden is looking really good now with all this attention and we hope to enter it into Bath in Bloom next year. The regular volunteering days are also going really well too, with lots being achieved. Bill Sheppard who has been volunteering at the farm for over a month has built us a fantastic new duck house. We will be building a new duck pond soon so that we can get some more ducks (the comical Indian Runner sort). We have also removed all invasive reeds from the wildlife pond, given the sheep their health check, de-wormed and de-liced the chickens, amongst many other jobs. Volunteering days are every Monday from 10am –3pm. Please call Helen at the office if you are interested. Funding News There’s not a lot of funding news for this newsletter, but lots of donations have been trickling in and keeping the place ticking over. One of the larger sums has come from First Great Western, and we have used their generous donation of £250 to buy a bigger and better incubator. It can hold up to 40 eggs so there’s plenty of space for hatchlings to stretch their newfound legs and wings. Somer Housing group have donated £105 for a new duck house, which has now been built, and another pond to accommodate future new ducks. Our fabulous Summer Fun Day back in August raised a whopping £1,300, which is the most ever raised on any Fun Day so far. The money will go into the general farm pot, which pays for anything ranging from hay bales to office stationery. The National Lottery ‘Reaching Communities’ bid has now been sent in, and we can expect to receive a decision in November/December. If it is successful, the grant will pay for several farm posts for three years, so keep everything crossed! Thank You We are very grateful to Steve White, director of Bath Contract Flooring, Ltd., for donating to us ten brand new High Visibility yellow jackets. These will be used on future Fun Days and other large events at the farm, and for other site work. There are so many people to thank for helping out at the Big Summer Fun Day. It goes without saying that the volunteers who helped organise it were invaluable. Big ‘thank you’s to all of following who donated raffle prizes: Dyson for their fantastic brand new vacuum cleaner worth £260; Lansdown Race Course; Theatre Royal; The Odeon; Pizza Express; Essensuals Hair Dressers; Bath City Football Club, and everyone else who donated prizes.  |
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