Clean water supply - PlayPumps

Although this is not related to Geology in the West Country, I thought you would all be interested to see this clever, but simple idea. Children play on a merry-go-round and pump water for villages at the same time. Girls benefit in particular because they are usually the ones fetching water.
For more information about PlayPumps International, click here.

Geodiversity in the North Wessex Downs AONB

Discover links between landscape, geology, biodiversity and land use at this one day meeting.

Saturday 8th March
10.30 a.m. - 4.00 p.m.
Bouverie Hall, Pewsey, Wiltshire SN9 5QE

Talks include:
Diversity in stone - a look at building materials and styles within the AONB
Geology and Landscape of the Marlborough Downs and Vale of Pewsey
North Wessex Downs - the last 100 million years
Conservation Target Areas - linking biodiversity habitats and geodiversity
Stream Geology and the freshwater crayfish
A look at woodland archaeology
An industrial heritage in the North Wessex Downs
Soils and their development within the North Wessex Downs

This meeting is supported by a grant from the North Wessex Downs
Sustainable Development Fund.

All are welcome. The day is free but registration is required - Lesley.dunlop@oxfordshire.gov.uk or 01993 814147
Please bring a packed lunch. Tea and coffee will be provided.

Field Trip to Brown's Folly - February 17th

Do come and join us on a walk to look at the varied Jurassic limestones at this important SSSI site.

We shall be meeting at 10.30 a.m. on Sunday February 17th in the car park at the top of the steep hill from Monkton Farleigh to Bathford - GR ST 798663. Strong boots and waterproofs are essential. The walk takes about 2 hours 30 minutes. The cost is £3 for visitors.

Details of Bath Geological Society's lectures and field trips can be found on the website - click here.

A plea for Tedbury Camp near Frome, Somerset

Hugh Prudden has written the following:-
The Somerset Geology Group hopes to get a grant to improve Tedbury Camp quarry near Frome.
You may know that there is a joint initiative (Natural England, UKRIGS, Geology Trusts and various funding bodies) to make funds available for improving sites. Tedbury is surely deserving removal of invasive scrub on the Inferior Oolite and the Carboniferous Limestone face. The latter is now inaccessible and is a superb place for students to log the bed by bed succession which we did years ago with the Devonshire Association to great effect. The steep eroded footpath is hazardous. Also some discrete signposts are needed.
The eye-catching unconformity is of course an important feature but we really should draw attention to the alternative approach via the footpath alongside the Mells River: a cave, superb bedding plain, a curious fold/thrust/slump (?), Dolomitic Conglomerate and the gorge-like valley itself are integral and important features of the locality. It also provides an alternative easier access.
David Roche of David Roche-GeoConsulting, has offered to put in an application on a kind of no-win-no-fee basis. I have expressed delight with this offer as, to be honest, I have neither time nor energy to become too involved in the bureaucratic aspects.
I am sure you will all agree that Tedbury deserves funding and restoration. At the same time the famous De la Beche quarry face down the valley needs management.
Are people aware of the viewing platform at nearby Holwell? (ST 723454) There is parking for a minibus on the corner of the Whatley-Holwell road just north of the junction with the A361. Follow the path to NNW for a few hundred yards and the platform is on the right. There is a splendid panorama of the large quarry and the famous unconformity can be picked out as it undulates around the edge of the worked-out area. In the distance, on a clear day, one can see Cley Hill, near Warminster, where Tertiary Clay-with-flints lies on top of the Chalk. Where else can you get such a sense of geological time and events in one view? Make your own time chart of the events. The photograph shows steeply dipping Carboniferous Limestone truncated by the undulating unconformity above which can be seen the yellow horizontal Inferior Oolite. Cley Hill can be seen in the distance.
There are some fifty similar entries in our Somerset Good Rock Guide. Simply click HERE and you will be surprised at the wealth of interesting and accessible sites awaiting you this summer.

Severn Barrage

This message was received from a local geologist.
"We are trying to alert local geologists to the possible problems which a Severn Barrage might create for us.
Natural England is raising this issue but I think we need to present a united front at some stage, as the biologists seem to have done already.
A lot of the coastline in the Avon area is covered by geological SSSI and RIGS designations and my main worry is the likely reduction of erosion of cliff sections and flooding of low water exposures. A major concern is that coastal sections are the most useful sites in the area for educational fieldwork, and I would hope we can prevent anything which reduced their value. I have personally taken some 500 groups to Aust Cliff and about 100 each to Portishead and Sand Point/Middle Hope, and really appreciate their special place!"

(Note: you can click on the underlined words to link to the websites.)

Brilliant free powerpoints

Have you seen the Geologists' Association's latest venture? If you click on Education in the menu on the GA website and then click on 'Your Planet Earth', you will see that the GA has launched the first set of talks for free use by earth sciences professionals as a basis for engagement and outreach science shows in schools. Some societies may well want to view them too. They are excellent - click here to view the page.

There are five titles so far:-

• Volcanoes
• Dinosaurs
• Natural Hazards
• Plate Tectonics
• Climate Change
  

Special Nature Supplement for IYPE

To celebrate the International Year of Planet Earth, this special Nature supplement explores recent developments and future directions in the Earth sciences. With climate change to the fore, Earth scientists have much to offer society, and these articles explore both our understanding of the planet and how this knowledge can be used to benefit the people who live on it.

There is free access to this supplement for the next 6 months.
I was alerted to this publication by the Nuffield Curriculum Centre, part of the Nuffield Foundation.