Thursday 28 June 2007

Donations and the future of the Watchpoint and blog

This was originally posted as a comment but would have been better as a full post to ensure wider readership, so here it is again. If you have read the comment already, then please skip reading it all again here!
Having been away for a few days (bad timing on my part!), I went down to the Green yesterday to catch up. I was pleased to see both youngsters flying about quite confidently. When we left, both had returned to the gargoyles up above the nest site and were busy feeding.
Regarding the offers of donations, the simplest way (for people in the UK) is to send a cheque, made out to 'Derbyshire Wildlife Trust', to the DWT office at East Mill, Belper, Derbyshire, DE56 1XH with a covering note saying 'For the Peregrine Project'. Please indicate if you would like a thank you letter or not (our default is to send one if an address is provided). Regarding overseas wellwishers who want to donate (such as Jenny) please send an email address to enquiries@derbyshirewt.co.uk saying what you wish to do and we will give you our bank account details etc.
We (the three partners) have covered most of this year's direct costs but still need considerable funds to develop the project further (eg the educational side) and also for new camera's and other IT equipment/leaflets etc for next season. If Nick at the museum needs to spend money on the project over and above that available to him via the council or from Capita UK, he either asks the Trust to buy it or he invoices us for it.
It is also possible to join the Derbyshire Wildlife Trust if you live in or near the county and we would urge you to do so. Please see the Trust website (a link to it is on the blog). If you live further away, why not join your own county wildlife trust? A full list of UK wildlife trusts plus contacts is available via the DWT website.
The Watch Point will continue only as far as this Saturday (30th) so now is an appropriate chance to say a big thanks to everyone who has helped out on Cathedral Green since we started back in mid-May. We have not counted the number of visitors we have had but it must be several 1000s! We would also like to thank everyone who put money in our donation boxes and we will post a final total when the watchpoint is finished.
As to the future of the blog, we were discussing earlier today how we might gently run it down over the next few months as news of the birds gets less frequent and (hopefully) less scary....those first few days in the air are very stressful for sure! More on this soon....

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

11.35pm B.C time, theres a bird in the nest! :-)

Anonymous said...

I think it would be good to leave the Blog open until October when the birds leave Derby. At 07:45 UK, I think it is a young chick as it is too large to be the male, but looks as if 'waiting for breakfast...'.

Anonymous said...

The bird that's been on the nest platform since about 7.40 this morning is one of the adults (not sure which as I've not had a clear look). You can tell the adults from the juveniles by their plumage but on the webcam colours aren't always easy to distinguish -

Adults have a slate grey back and head with whitish breast and underparts with HORIZONTAL dark grey streaks on the belly.

Juveniles have a dark brown back and head with a buff coloured breast and underparts with VERTICAL brown streaks on the whole area.

The bird I was looking at definitely had horizontal stripes.

Hope this is useful to some of you.

Andy M

Anonymous said...

Reference donations, all of us who been involved with the birds may feel that if we sent monies that WE want to go towards the PEREGRINE FAMILY may be used in other projects, THIS WE DO NOT WANT.Derby is a first class PEREGRINE FALCON place of education for all ages and races, this has been demonstrated by the number of visitors on the net and the green over the past 5 or 6 weeks. Hear what we say please, let the people of derby have a say and help. Tony

Peregrine Project Member (Nick M.) said...

Can I assure you that neither the Museum, the Cathedral nor the Wildlife Trust would accept any money for the Peregrine Project and use it for other things. Our accountants, for one, would not permit this, providing donors clearly indicate how a donation is to be used. The Wildlife Trust will hold any monies donated to the project on behalf of us all.

Donations made on Cathedral Green this summer will go to payng for another 3 months contract with Streamdays - who, I'm sure you'll agree, have given us a superb service. We now need to purchase our own video recorder to replace the one loaned to us by the BBC. We would like to purchase a third, moveable camera, but this requires careful discussions with the cathedral and planners. We would like to deliver full speed video to lcoal school children in Derby and Derbyshire, and top develop a range of educational resources around the peregrines. Our telescopes and tripods need servicing; our abseiler and platform builder should be given (and I exclude myself from this) something to re-imburse his time and effort. Our publicity leaflet will need to be reprinted next season. Oh, there's so much we could put funds towards that you have no fear that it would go elsewhere. All the partners are behind the project at the highest level and want it to continue, securely, into future years.
I hope this reassures you.