Following on from the success of last year's inaugural Raise a Ransom for Wildlife fundraising event, held by the Manx Wildlife Trust, the nature conservation charity is currently looking for volunteers to join in this year’s event. This is to be held at the Trust’s Close Sartfield nature reserve in the Ballaugh Curragh from 10am to 12 noon on Wednesday, 14 March 2012.
Last year’s event, which involved volunteers being “held to ransom” while carrying out “hard labour” on the Trust’s Great Bog Project at Close Sartfield, raised over ?2000 towards the proposed purchase of a new truck to allow the charity’s Reserves Officer continued access to the Trust’s nature reserves throughout the Island, with all of the necessary tools for their upkeep. However, there is still some way to go before the Manx Wildlife Trust will be in a position to buy a new truck – the most suitable model is estimated to cost in the region of ?20,000 – and so once again, all proceeds from this year’s fundraising event will go into the charity’s Truck Fund.
As before, the volunteers will be put to work at Close Sartfield for 2 hours or until they can raise a minimum “ransom” of ?250 by calling family, friends and colleagues.
The Manx Wildlife Trust’s Fundraising and Wildlife Advocacy Officer, Anne Marie Kilgallon, said, “Our dedicated conservation volunteers – or Muckers as they’re more commonly known! - have recently been busy working on one of the willow coppice blocks at Close Sartfield. Coppicing has been practised in British woodlands for centuries and involves cutting trees down, allowing the stumps to regenerate for a number of years then harvesting the resulting stems. The stems are then used to make various products such as hurdles, baskets, fencing, brooms and, in our case, bundles of the stems that are used on our reserves, and more widely around the Island, to help prevent riverbank erosion. The ‘hard labour’ for the Raise a Ransom for Wildlife volunteers will therefore involve harvesting willow stems and making up the bundles - nothing too onerous - and we’ll even supply them with tea and cake to keep their strength up!”
Anne Marie went on to say, “Getting involved in the Raise a Ransom for Wildlife event is a great opportunity to gain first-hand experience of just some of the work carried out by the Manx Wildlife Trust. If last year’s event is anything to go by, it’ll also be good fun but most importantly will help to raise funds for our much-needed, new truck.”
Anyone interested in taking part in the Raise a Ransom for Wildlife event should contact Anne Marie at the Manx Wildlife Trust’s headquarters in Peel (tel. 844432) by 29 February 2012.
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