Early Spring 2024 newsletter

Welcome to the latest newsletter from the Cherishing Sidmouth Cemeteries project!

Early Spring 2024: work done so far:

In just a few weeks, the CSC working party have already made a huge difference to Sidmouth Cemetery – with a few valiant volunteers braving the weather to continue with raking the soggy grass: 

22nd Feb – Cherishing Sidmouth Cemeteries

The battle to keep down the brambles and to dig up the three-cornered leek also continues: 

15th to 21st Feb working parties – Cherishing Sidmouth Cemeteries

This has in turn allowed bulbs to burst forth, showing that early spring is indeed appearing. Plus, to help the volunteers in their work, Bradfords have generously donated some gardening gloves and dumpy bags! 

8th-14th Feb working parties – Cherishing Sidmouth Cemeteries

And what’s been especially heartening is how other groups are joining in – and so, earlier in the month, the Scouts were up there – both clearing and creating, because, as this project shows, we can do both: 

“As lots of cover for wildlife was being removed, it was important to try and replace this, so several brash piles were made from fallen branches. Invertebrates, amphibians, birds and small mammals will all find these useful for food and shelter.” 

The Sidmouth Scouts lend a hand! – Cherishing Sidmouth Cemeteries 

New way to sign in for the working party:

To make sure every volunteer is covered by accident and liability insurance when they are delving away, a new online sign-in system has been put in place: 

BWP – Cherishing Sidmouth Cemeteries  

So, if you’d like to join one of the regular Thursday morning sessions [or others when advertised], it’s very straightforward:

  • Just make sure you’re a member of both CSC and the VGS [ie: on both mailing lists] – which can be done through that same BWP link.
  • And then you can book yourself a safe and secure spot for that date.

Hope to see you up at the Cemetery!

Looking to the future…

We are dealing with the council on several issues – including:

  • clarifying the ongoing Management Plan
  • obtaining and storing tools 
  • clearing and mending paths
  • dealing with dog mess

Do get in touch should you have further issues which you feel need raising.

Cherishing Sidmouth Cemeteries is on Facebook!

The CSC project is grateful to the Herald for showcasing the work up at the Cemetery – and we’re hoping for another article in the paper very shortly.

Plus there is the very active website of course:

Cherishing Sidmouth Cemeteries – A Vision Group for Sidmouth initiative

And now there is an addition to our ways of engaging – and getting some feedback. We have just launched our own Facebook page – to post news and views and to give details of any extra sessions you can sign in for:

Cherishing Sidmouth Cemeteries | Facebook

Do add any comments or the like.

Look forward to hearing from you!

The CSC team