April Update

Our 5th AGM is on Wednesday 27th April at Pontarddulais Cricket Club @7.30pm
(Back Room)        

Everyone is welcome to join and Membership is £2 for the year 

April has been another quiet month in the park but work is still ongoing.

Our Place

'Our Place' based at Canolfan y Bont have been out and about in the park working on pathways and clearance work over the last few weeks.
While progress is slow, they are getting on with the job, while also meeting and greeting members of the public who take the time to stop and have a chat about the support work they do. Also the dogs are making a new friend with one group member who keeps their attention away from the fact that their owners have stopped for a chinwag.
(Dogs are there to be walked not to listen to their masters stop and talk!

The team will also be increasing their presence in the park over the coming months as more people join the organisation.

If you would like to know more about the work this group do please call into the Canolfan for a chat they would love to hear from you.

Bluebells

The Bluebells are now starting to appear in the second woods.

The park also featured in an Evening Post article about being one of the best Bluebell walks in the Swansea area.

https://www.facebook.com/SWEveningPost/posts/1061428280596424

Seasonal Pond and other Birdlife

The Boardwalk is a great place to spot this years Ducklings from, as several members of the public have spotted some paddling with mum and dad.
And a Buzzard has been spotted flying around near the Coed Bach entrance and has been dazzling park users with its arial display.
We hope the Buzzard wont go near the pond area!


Overhanging Branches

These have been reported to the park authority and a team will be out to sort these out shortly as some of them are becoming a bit of an annoyance as they are hanging over pathways causing a slight obstruction.

Dog Laws

Much has been said lately on our other media pages about dog walkers in the park and we would like to remind people that small posters are placed at park entrances and clearly state what the dog laws are.

As usual we are on Facebook and Twitter and you can click the links at the top of this Blog.

March Review

March has been a busy month for us at FOCBP. We started the month with the launch of our Facebook and Twitter sites. (The links can be found above this post just click on the tabs.)
Plenty of people have joined these pages and we have also had a few contributions from others as well which has been great.

The biggest job we have had done in the park this month was a bit of reshaping of the seasonal pond.
When we cleared the area in November 2013 we were unaware that there was an old pipe which was not marked on any maps running into the pond. And over the months water was slowly draining out of the pond and some flooding was occuring up to the pathway.
A Dam has now been added and the water is now holding in the pond quite nicely.
Also a smaller dam was added on the furthest side of the pond due to water flowing into the area being slightly polluted. This Dam is a simple set of haybales which helps act as a natural filter for any impurities trying to enter the main body of water.

Reshaping

Filter Dam

Finished Dam

Volunteers have also been busy over the park in the last month.

A course on pruning fruit trees took place at the start of the month and Jeff Richards supervisor of Swansea Botanical Gardens ran an afternoon session on how to prune the trees. This was a well attended activity and great fun was had by one and all.

Gaynor and Christine attended a Friends members forum in Swansea this was a chance for all park groups to meet up and share ideas and report back to Swansea City Council on how things were progressing in their own parks.

Our volunteers have been hard at it in the park with clearance work and meeting Council representatives with sorting out problems and finding ways forward to fix them.

Drainage is constantly looked at

And also our resident artist Gaynor Fuge has been busy making keyring fobs which are on sale at Craftiau y Bont on St Teilo Street.
Monies raised from these go towards FOCBP tools and equiptment.

The Wildlife is now beginning to come alive once again in the park.
The trees are full of birds and flowers (Especially the Bluebells) are beginning to flower.

1st sign of the bluebells

Members of the public continue to use the park and quite a few people have remarked how nice the place is looking.
Thank You for all your kind comments as it makes it all worth while :-)

Your dog will always find something to roll in :-)

We were handed an old image of Christie O' Neill who was a park keeper many moons ago.

Thank you to everyone that has contributed to our Social Media pages over the last few weeks and we hope to see you enjoying yourselves in the park soon.


We will be holding our AGM on April 29th at Pontarddulais Cricket Club.

February 2015 news.

The 4th AGM of the Friends will be taking place at end of April so members please have a think about wanting to stand for the committee or if you are not a member and wish to join us please feel free as your input will be more than welcome. Membership subs will also be due and we may have to increase it to £2 a year per person as the subs cover our group insurance that we have with Keep Wales Tidy and our insurance has gone up this year. 

  

Also you may have noticed that a new Skateboard ramp has been built by the BMX track next to the rugby club hard standing area. This is being well used by the youngsters and soon a grind box and bar will also be added.

A big 'Thank you' to Swansea CC for installing it for us.

And also Swansea CC also provided us with a machine to cut back a lot of the undergrowth in the park this has given us a great blank canvas to allow the Bluebells to grow. 

And you may have noticed that large areas of growth have been cut back around the second woods area a big 'Thank you.' to Dillwyn for all his efforts and we hope that we will be rewarded with a sea of bluebells this year.

And we also thank the other members for the work they have been carrying out over the last few months on various jobs around the park.

Our next meeting is on Wednesday 25th Feb at 7.30pm at Pontarddulais cricket club.

As usual we extend our open hands to anyone that would like to join in with us.

AGM and Meeting

On Wednesday 30th April we will be holding our annual AGM meeting in Pontarddulais Cricket Club this takes place at 7.30pm.
Straight afterwards we will hold our usual monthly meeting as usual we will welcome anyone who is interested to come and join us for a drink and a chat.

AGM Friday 13th April 2012

We held our 1st AGM meeting on friday 13th April 2012 in the Mechanics Institute Pontarddulais the meeting was open to members of the public.
Our 2011-2012 comittee consisted of Vyv Fuge (Chairman) Christine Thomas (Secretary) Margaret Maden (Treasurer) Joy Walker (Vice Chair) Gaynor Fuge (Comittee member)

The 2011-2012 outgoing comittee
Rear Left Gaynor Fuge/ Rear Right Joy Walker
Front left Vyv Fuge/ Middle Christine Thomas/ Right Margaret Maden.

The Newly elected 2012-2013 Comittee consists of Catherine Thomas (Chairwoman) Kay Lloyd (Vice Chair) Christine Thomas (Secretary) Margaret Maden (Treasurer) Martin Hanson (Comittee member)

The 2012-2013 Newly elected members
Rear Left Catherine Thomas/ Rear Right /Christine Thomas
Front left Martin Hanson/Middle Kay lloyd/Right Margaret Maden

We the newly elected members would like to thank everybody for their efforts over the last year.

A few more images from the meeting taken by Martin Hanson on his blog site:-
http://mph-photo.blogspot.co.uk/2012/04/community-group-meeting.html

AGM and Public Meeting

On Friday 13th April in Pontarddulais Institute we are holding a general meeting and our 1st AGM.


The start time for the meeting will be 7.00pm and followed by the AGM at 7.30pm.


Please feel free to pop in and get involved.
Hope to see you there.