What's been happening...
REACT chair, Simon Perry's recent interview on CHAOS Radio.
Here’s a link to the recording and a brief summary of the transcript:
Simon highlights the importance of educating young people, especially through collaborations with local schools and the Roseland Academy. He invites new members and volunteers, emphasizing inclusivity and community involvement. Future plans include revisiting renewable energy projects and expanding public engagement via a new website and Facebook page. He concludes by encouraging everyone to take individual environmental action, reinforcing REACT’s motto: ‘Local people, local action, for a thriving, sustainable Roseland'.
Events
On Friday 18th July REACT was delighted to host a small group of employees from Pendennis Shipyard in Falmouth who were keen to support a local environmental charity. Crossing on the St Mawes ferry in the morning, the group travelled to Veryan to team up with REACT volunteers at our tree nursery. Many hands make light work and with this combined enthusiastic workforce we were able to weed and mulch trees planted by school children this year, fit donated re-used tree shelters, weed the tree nursery itself and cut back growth on the willow tunnel. We also watered the young trees which of course ensured it rained heavily over the weekend!
The Pendennis group moved on to take part in the monthly Westcountry Rivers Trust’s water quality survey on Pendower Stream including an additional baseline invertebrate survey. Insect larvae are very small at this time of the year, but we found quite a few stonefly and mayfly nymphs indicating that despite increased phosphate levels organic pollution isn’t currently a major issue. Highlights included finding a dragonfly larva and spotting a silver washed fritillary butterfly dashing about in the dappled woodland sunshine.
Our final task was a beach clean at Pelyn. This NT beach is notorious for tiny pieces of plastic, especially discarded fishing line and sections of netting. Thanks to the National Trust for providing litter pickers and other equipment we were able to fill three bags of rubbish and a small amount of recyclable material, and collect some ‘fishermen’s kisses’, sections of discarded netting which can be recycled into sunglasses by Newquay based company Waterhaul. This short film provides more information about this issue…
This was a really worthwhile exercise and REACT hopes to keep in touch with the Shipyard and hopefully host similar days in the future. If you are a local company and would like us to organise an ‘away day’ for you, supporting work on the environment, please get in touch.
The Hidden Wonders of St Mawes' Harbour
Check out this amazing film, using the link above, showing the wonders of St Mawes' Harbour. This is an inspiring project brought to you by Cornwall Councils' Nature Recovery Team.
During the day there will be a stall showcasing the work of the teams and the chance to experience a journey underwater through the seagrass and kelp using Virtual Reality headsets.
Cornwall Climate Care Stories: Living On The Edge
https://www.cornwallclimate.org/films/living-on-the-edge
On April 8th REACT hosted another Cornwall Climate Care film at the Harbour Club in Portscatho. The film entitled “Living on the Edge" gave a stark insight into coastal erosion and flooding and the impacts for our Cornish communities now as well as predictions for the future.
A sizeable audience from around the Roseland attended and put wide ranging questions to the expert panel after the film. Simon Perry of REACT fielded questions to the panel from the audience.
The expert panel comprising Bill Makin General Manager of the National Trust (Mid & S.E Cornwall), Gitty Ankers, Chair of Cornwall Community Flood Forum and Amy Richardson, Community Engagement Officer for Cornwall Community Flood Forum, explained their professional backgrounds and their current roles in this field.
The film and the questions and answers provided the attendees with huge insight into the challenges of coastal erosion and flooding. Clearly we should not be constructing new buildings in areas vulnerable to coastal erosion and we must accept that hard/man-made defences can be counterproductive in some places. As a society we cannot afford to protect every coastal region but by using expert knowledge, working with nature and enabling communities to find their own solutions and compromises, a way forward can and must be found. The speakers talked about the role of sand-dunes and beaches as part of the natural system against storms. Dunes and beaches take the high impact of storms and should be allowed to shift and reform. If buildings are constructed close to the sand, then there is no ‘breathing space’ and the land and buildings take the impact of the storm- potentially damaging homes and livelihoods.
Very many thanks to our expert panel and our audience for such a thought provoking evening.
More details about the work of:
Cornwall Community Flood Forum Cornwall Community Flood Forum – Flood Training and Information in Cornwall
National Trust https://www.nationaltrust.org.uk