Category: Missed a ThameNews story?

LIZ Lochhead?s new translation of Moli

IT seems hard to believe Easter is over and what a hideous weekend it was weatherwise. Where has this year gone? It has been a very busy one for me and I was really looking forward to a few days off. I have finally had time to think about re-planting my garden and all the plants are here waiting to be put in the ground. The vegetable patch was finally dug over last weekend, in between showers, and I already have an impressive array of seedlings ready to go in the ground.

This year I am trying a few unusual crops. There are some great salad crops in the Marshall?s catalogue, such as ?Mesclun Salad Mix? which promises ?traditional young green leaves with both mild and spicy flavours?. An old favourite Greek Cress with a really hot kick to it ? fine for growing on a window sill. Aubergine Ophelia ? a baby fruit variety which is ?perfectly suited to growing on a sunny patio?. Let?s hope we have some sun and I am successful. This year I have decided to go a bit mad on tomatoes and am growing four different varieties. One of the most successful last year was ?Golden Cherry?. They were so tiny and so divinely sweet they often didn?t make it to the kitchen table!

As always, I try to grow things that are more expensive in the supermarkets ? I find it rather gratifying to think it has only cost me the price of a packet of seeds. Okay, there is the digging, watering and nurturing to take into account, but the results far outweigh the effort.

If any of you are tempted to have a try, Harrod Horticultural ?
www.harrodhorticultural.com Pinbush Road, Lowestoft, Suffolk NR33 7NL have small Timber Raised Beds starting from

A NEW exhibition at Oxfordshire County Council?s Central Library reveals when wolves last roamed the countryside between Oxford and Kidlington – and it was not as long ago as you might think!
Gosford Hill Farm in Kidlington was the home of Oxford Zoo between 1931 and 1937. A ?zoo-mad? population regularly piled on to special buses from the city centre to see star attractions Rosie the elephant and Hanno the lion.

Wolves were also housed at the zoo and the escape of three of them in 1937 provided a drama that is now the subject of a fascinating exhibition called Zoo-mad at Oxfordshire Studies in Oxford Central Library.

Thrilling chase

The wolves were 14-months-old, and one was said to be six feet in length after it was shot.

Inspector Barnett of the City Police brought down the first wolf near the police houses in Banbury Road on the same day the wolves escaped.

Robert Collett of Hampton Poyle shot the second wolf the same evening at his father’s farm. The third wolf survived until Thursday after allegedly killing 13 sheep at a farm near North Oxford Golf Club.

Press photographer shoots wolf

That evening, Oxford Mail photographer, Johnny Johnson, gave chase to the wolf, and shot it in Summertown.

He had commandeered a bike from a cyclist on the A40 and ridden up to the house where children were yelling ‘There’s the wolf, there’s the wolf’; before shooting the animal dead from 30 yards.

Malcolm Graham, Head of Oxfordshire County Council’s Oxfordshire Studies, said: ?We?ve recently acquired some Oxford Zoo postcards and these inspired me to find out more about this short-lived entertainment venue.

?Like so many aspects of local history, it?s an intriguing story once you delve into it and where better to start than Oxfordshire Studies!?

The exhibition will run until 6 April at Oxford Central Library in the Oxfordshire Studies section, at the Westgate Centre, Oxford.

AT last it feels as though spring is just around the corner with lovely sunny days (albeit still quite cold) and the evenings definitely gettinglighter. The vegetable patch is nearly dug over and I have loads of
seedlings coming through ready for planting. Exciting times ? AND theclocks go forward later this month.
Keeping on this cheerful note, you might be pleased to learn that the jinx on my holidays has now been well and truly lifted. I spent a delightful four days in Ireland with no hitches ? apart from a 40 minute delay on the way back!
I flew out on Friday morning and sauntered down the cost to my destination ? Durrus – on the Sheep?s Head peninsula. This is quite close to Bantry so I had a wee look at the town and sampled an excellent Irish Stew (had to be done) before heading off to my B & B. I was made to feel very welcome and it turned out Alice is a very keen gardener so we had plenty to talk about. After a leisurely breakfast on Saturday we went off to The Good Things Caf

BY Nicholas Newman www.oxfordprospect.co.uk.
Dr. Bjorn Lomborg aged 42, heads the Copenhagen Consensus Centre, is adjunct professor at Copenhagen Business School Denmark, and author of the best selling books ?The Skeptical Environmentalist? and ?Cool It?. Bjorn was named one of the “50 people who could save the planet” by the Guardian newspaper in 2008.

Bjorn Lomborg has been described as one of Europe?s leading scientific and political realists, who has brought courage to those that wish to discuss and debate environmental issues in a scientific rational, compassionate and logical manner.

Bjorn?s work has brought a breath of fresh air to the debate for he has challenged many of the almost dogmatic claims about global warming, overpopulation, energy resources, deforestation, species loss and water shortages using scientific methods of evidence, analysis and assessment.

It is not generally realised that Dr. Bjorn Lomborg does not dispute the existence of climate change, but questions the priority given to specific solutions, in particular, co2 emissions, put forward by the likes of the former American Vice President Al Gore. In so doing Lomborg is providing Europe?s politicians, like Chancellor Merkel and President Sarkozy with the public policy toolkit on which to determine government priorities to tackle the problems Europe faces.

Bjorn Lomborg ? the man
Dr. Lomborg is the sceptical environmentalist, and probably the most famous Dane since the Viking Eric the Red? It is a pleasure to listen to this impressive friendly Danish academic. Bjorn looks like a professional tennis player; there is hardly a trace of his Danish heritage in his bubbling Californian accent. Of his friends Bjorn says: ?they are always happy to share a pizza and play with my X-box.?

Global Warming is not our first priority
?Gore?s film ?An Inconvenient Truth? makes three points; global warming is real, it will be catastrophic and addressing it should be our first priority. Inconveniently for the film?s producers, however, only the first statement is correct.? Bjorn says.

Not only does Lomborg question the solutions put forward to deal with the problems involved but is also sceptical of the often simplistic correlations made between physical phenomena and the degree of effect of such phenomena.

To take one example the recent flooding in Prague and Dresden are simplistically often attributed to global warming, though other scientific hydrological studies of historical records, tend rather to indicate that these events are well within normal parameters.

Another example is where the doomsday scenario predicts that the sea level rise consequent on climate change will mean that the Netherlands will be submerged under 6.5 metres of water. Such exaggeration, Lomborg points out, is not backed by IPCC (UN Climate Change Committee) research. In fact, they expect a more manageable 38.5cm, which means cities like Amsterdam and London will easily be able to improve their flood defences.

As for Possible Solution?
Turning to possible solutions for dealing with the effects of climate change, Lomborg argues that rather than concentrating almost solely on reductions in CO2 emissions, attention should rather be given to what might be called social/political alternatives. It would be more effective if we spent our scarce resources on human happiness (which, after all, should be the point of environmentalism), such as poverty alleviation, anti-malarial programs, and similar measures.

For example, anticipated costs of ?1 trillion to reduce carbon emissions sufficiently to have a global effect, might be more efficiently applied to the prevention and treatment of HIV/Aids, the elimination of malaria and the provision of clean drinking water to the world?s poor?

In other words attention should be given to a cost benefit analysis approach, which would have more certain results in both the short and long term.

What Bjorn Lomborg has achieved is to provide Europe?s decision makers with a set of policies, including increased spending on research and development, in particular nuclear power, on which to base informed rational decisions. Such policies Dr. Lomborg suggests, will not only be more cost effective, but provide greater economic development opportunities than Gore?s policies which are likely to significantly limit future opportunities to deal with future problems.

Perhaps this explains why the Kyoto Protocol has not been fully implemented and adopted by the world?s nations and as Bjorn observed about the recent IPCC conference in Bali in December 2007: ?that little concrete progress had been accomplished, despite the theatrics. In fact since 1995 little has been achieved.?

Finally, perhaps the greatest irony is that whilst the EU enthuses over the Kyoto Protocol in contrast to the US hostility the reality is, Lomborg observes is that: ?since 1990 the growth in EU?s emissions have tended to increase ahead of the US.?

Seems actions speak louder than words?

Dr. Bjorn Lomborg http://www.lomborg.com/

Bjorn Lomborg : video talk on ?Our priorities for saving the world? http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/view/id/62

Copenhagen Consensus Centre http://www.copenhagenconsensus.com/

IPCC – Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change http://www.ipcc.ch/

Eric The Red http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Erik_the_Red

Guardian Newspaper http://www.guardian.co.uk

Al Gore http://www.algore.com/

WILL this rain ever stop? January 2008 is heading for the record books as the wettest ever. I can quite believe it. Every time I try and get out to work in the garden the heavens open. The bulbs are already poking through and I haven?t even finished my winter clear up. The vegetable patch needs digging over, but at the moment is still full of plants heeled in during my October tidy up. It will be Easter before I get organised at this rate!!

I am at last beginning to feel better ? it?s 21st January and all around me people are saying this is the most depressing day of the year. Not for me ? it?s about the first day I have felt reasonable for five weeks. I pray this awful virus is behind me and I can get back to some normality.

Having had two holidays thwarted last year I am going for third time lucky and taking a little sojourn to Southern Ireland in February. As most of you know I do enjoy a bit of cooking, so I have decided to combine the two and go on a ?Fish Orgy? weekend where I shall be cooking fish, fish, fish and fish. Everything we cook will be in season and it would be wonderful to think it all came out of the ocean just beneath the caf

A THAME resident, who dodged the buzz bombs in wartime London to visit her mother, has died aged 98 years.
ELLEN ETHEL (NELL) McCARTHY, who had lived in Orchard Close, Thame, since 1989, was born on January 18, 1910, died peacefully in her sleep on January 27, 2008.

She was the youngest daughter of five children of a publican, Thomas Ward Hartley and Emily Catherine Cooper, who were married and ran The White Horse and Bower in Horseferry Road, Westminster.

Nell married William Dennis (Bill) McCarthy who lived round the corner in Medway Street, in 1934; they had one child, William (Billy) McCarthy the following year. Bill junior lives in Thame with his wife.

The first year or so of Nell and Bill’s married life was in a flat in Fentiman Road, Lambeth. From there they moved to Shap Crescent, Carshalton, Surrey. In 1937 they moved to Neasden where, sadly Bill died of a heart attack in 1978.

Nell leaves five grandchildren and nine great grandchildren and was a very caring and loving Nanna and Great Nanna.
Her younger brother, Joe, is 92 and still alive and ‘going strong’ in Harlow Essex.

Bill junior said: “Nell was a very caring and loving mum, particularly during the war while Dad was away. Although the buzzbombs where around we still went to see her parents at the White Horse and Bower in Westminster every alternate weekend.”

Nell was a very keen gardener and kept a very nice garden in Neasden and in Thame.

Unfortunately in very late life she needed home carers who found her to be a lovable character who knew her own mind and what she wanted.

Nell was very independent, determined, and happy to live in her own home and not go into an old people?s home ever.

Nell will be sadly missed by the family and all who knew her.
The Cremation will be held at Amersham next Wednesday, February 6, at 2.30pm.

Photo: Nell, aged 20, with her mum at brighton,

TIM is waiting for a new home. Aged 11, he has been with short-term foster carers for over a year. After it became clear, he could not return to live with his parents and that his Nan was too ill to care for him, the search began to find him a long term ? permanent foster home. Tim needs someone to come forward who could foster him until he can live independently. Ideally Tim will be the only or youngest child in the household. Some months have now passed since the search began but sadly no-one has come forward.

Emma has been living with foster carers for 3 months. She originally went to live with them on an emergency basis. After just a few days of going to live with her emergency foster carers, it became apparent that the problems at home would take a while to fix and that Emma would need to remain in foster care for some months. Emma has settled quite well with her current foster carers but is not happy to have been placed so far from her home. She finds this makes it difficult to see her family, and friends and she positively hates the 20-mile each way journey to school each day. She is hoping that her social worker will move her to foster carers who live nearer to home but each time her social worker visits the news is sadly the same, ?Sorry, but there is no-one available?.

Local independent fostering agency, familyplacement.com, is working to help Tim and Emma and other children like them. The agency seeks to do this by recruiting foster carers for children in or near to their home area and by encouraging people to consider fostering as an alternative to work outside of the home. As agency director, Andy Clipson says, ?Our foster carers are paid a professional fee in addition to a child maintenance allowance. This allows some people to give up work to start a new career in fostering. Proper rewards do not stop foster carers from loving the kids?. ?All of the agency?s foster carers are also provided with high level support and ongoing training to help them to develop their parenting skills to a higher level.?

If you think you might be able to help. Please call 01993 201514 or email: info@familyplacement.com

A VERY Happy New Year to you all. I hope you had a wonderful Christmas and well-earned break? December was pretty chaotic here. A new shower and basin were being fitted in the bathroom at the same time as
the office was being underpinned. This involved having to move a fair amount of the contents of my office into my little cottage and the contents of the bathroom into my bedroom. Not great planning!!
Thankfully, both were completed just before Christmas but it took me until New Year?s day to finally sort out the office ready for 2008.

Sadly, my plans of a break in Florence were scuppered at the last moment. It seems any idea of travel in 2007 was fated. I woke up on 16th with the beginnings of a really nasty virus. I took to my bed for four
days and made a remarkable recovery, only to come down with it again for New Year – a quiet non-event under the circumstances. Christmas itself was good.

Now it is back to reality and I start the year with some very interesting projects, some still on the drawing board, others underway and some nearing completion. We are forecast some fairly dismal weather later this week but I often find clear days in January/February are ideal for catching up on some of the jobs overlooked in November and December. My garden is no exception. Since the massive clear up in October I have hardly had a moment to finish what I started.
The seed catalogues are in and I am planning all
sorts for the vegetable patch. Last year was really successful and it is now I realise just how valuable it is to keep a record of everything sown.
I still have bare borders to plant up and provided the ground is not frozen this can be done at any time. I am still wrestling with too many ideas and not enough space. Sometimes I just have to live vicariously through all your planting schemes. I am working on a Mediterranean style garden around a swimming pool at the moment and dream of being
able to plant my own space in this style.
For the moment I have to concentrate on new designs? I hope to get out to take some photographs this year and look forward to catching up as many of you as possible.

RECIPE
Parma Ham with Warm Chestnuts, Rocket and Sage Oil
12 Sage Leaves
175ml Extra Virgin Olive Oil
Zest of a Lemon
30 Chestnuts
Rocket Leaves
12 slices Parma Ham

Bruise the sage leaves with a rolling pin. Place in a saucepan with the oil and lemon zest. The lemon zest should be cut in wide strips. Put over a very low heat and warm for about 10 minutes. Remove from the heat and set aside.
If using fresh chestnuts ? make an incision on the flat side of the nut and then immerse in simmering water and cook for 10-15 minutes. Remove from the pan and peel away the skin. Place in the warm sage and lemon oil. Return to the heat and warm for about 10 minutes. Set aside.
Toss the rocket through the chestnuts then divide among four plates.
Lay a few slices of Parma Ham on top and serve.
We had this over Christmas and it was deliciously light as a starter.

SEASONAL TIPS
If you still haven?t disposed of your Christmas tree can I encourage you to recycle it? Contact your local council to find out where they are offering this service.
Most of the tips I mentioned in December can still be carried out this month. Leaf drop was late this year, so you might still need to continue to sweep them up. Remember to bag them up for leaf mould ? see
November?s Newsletter.
Don?t forget the birds at this time of year. Children might like to make their own titbits? We used to, and I still do; use pine cones coated in lard and then rolled in birdseed. A messy job, but the children enjoy making them and the birds love them. Just tie the cones on to a bit of string and hang up.
Remember, milk and bread is not good for hedgehogs ? dog food is a much better option. If you want to encourage hedgehogs, why not buy them a little house ?available from www.mrmcgregors.com (07778
529421)

Continue to clean and maintain garden tools. I also make time to wash all my pots and containers ready for planting up seeds later this month.
As you know, my preferred seed catalogue is Marshalls (www.marshalls-seeds.co.uk) or www.seedsofitaly.com. Both offer a really good range. I have just ordered garlic from Marshalls and if I pot it up and place it on a windowsill, I should be eating fresh garlic by mid summer.
Hardwood cuttings can be taken from woody plants, such as Cornus and Weigela.

VEGETABLE & FRUIT GARDEN
Sow broad bean, leek, brassicas and onion seeds under glass. Marshalls sell onion sets and I can thoroughly recommend ?Red Baron?. 100 onions cost about

IT doesn’t seem possible that December is just around the corner and another year is coming to a close. It has been quite an eventful one with plenty of really exciting projects, some nearing completion and others just beginning.
My job is made all the better working with all of you and I wish you a Very Happy Christmas and prosperous new year.
Jeremy, his wife and I went off to the Park Lane Hilton a couple of weeks ago to collect our award. It was an amazing event with about 700 people attending. The quality of work was exceptional and we feel very proud to have been a part of it. We think we will enter one or two next year and I am going to get a few published – so we might well be in contact in the spring/early summer to come and get some professional photographs taken.

The next three weeks are going to be a bit chaotic here, so I apologise in advance for any inconveniences. My office is sinking in one corner, which means I shall have to have it taken down and re-built. This is going to involve a military operation as my cottage is so small. Most of the contents of the office will be boxed up and stored in my neighbour?s garage and the rest in my sitting room and kitchen. We hope to have internet connection and my drawing board fully operative, but the reality remains to be seen. December is not the ideal time to have this work done, but it was the only slot we could find that suited everyone involved. The boxes are sitting here right next to me and I am going to make a start later today.

As a treat I have decided to take myself off to Florence for a mini-break from 16th to 19th December in the hope that I come back to a fully operative office ready for 2008. It is also a great excuse to stock up on some goodies for Christmas.

I hope you all have a wonderful break and I look forward to seeing many of you in 2008.

RECIPE

English Onion, Pale Ale and Horseradish Pot
3 tbs Olive Oil
3 white onions
2 cloves garlic
750ml stock
1 tsp white wine vinegar
100g Jerusalem artichokes
2tbs Demerara sugar
Oil for frying
270ml pale ale
4tbs grated horseradish
sea salt

Put Olive oil in a saucepan and add the peeled and sliced onions, sliced garlic and sugar. Cook on a low heat for 10-15 minutes until they are soft and golden. Add the pale ale, turn up the heat and reduce the liquid by half. Add the grated horseradish, stock and vinegar and cook for another 25-30 minutes. Place the peeled and sliced artichokes in a pan of hot oil and cook until crisp. Drain and season with the sea salt. Pour the soup into pots and garnish with the artichoke.

SEASONAL TIPS

As the weather has been relatively mild you could still plant bulbs.

If you have herbs in pots, such as Bay or Myrtle they could probably benefit from a bit of winter protection. Either bring them indoors or cover in some fleece. Other plants that could benefit from protection include:Tree ferns, Phormiums, Agapanthus

Pack a bit of straw around the leaves or fronds and then wrap in fleece. Straw is usually available in small packs in pet shops and you can buy fleece by the meter or in manageable packs from garden centres.

Plant roses, shrubs and trees. If you order bare root check when they first arrive and if they look in the least bit dry, water for several hours before planting.

If you have new borders to plant, or indeed the vegetable patch, now is a good time to dig over thoroughly and add good farmyard manure, rotted garden compost or other bulky organic matter. This will help break down the soil ready for planting in the spring.

Check stakes and tree ties before the winter weather sets in.

with most of the perennials now dormant it is a good time to take stock of the garden. Take a notebook and jot down where you have spaces and what you think might look good next year.

Clean up garden tools and oil them if necessary.

VEGETABLES AND FRUIT GARDEN

Keep watering if we get dry spells.

Lift and store root vegetables. Many can remain in the ground but species such as potato, celeriac and beetroot will suffer in the frosts.

Sow broad beans (Super Aquadulce is particularly frost resistant) and lettuces. If your ground is not too sticky or wet you can plant shallots and Jerusalem artichokes in December and January.

Fruit canes can all be planted out, as can garlic. Garlic needs at least one month in the ground with temperatures below 10 degrees in order to form bulbs. It is best not to use garlic bought in a supermarket. Try Marshalls www.marshalls-seeds.co.uk.

Winter prune apples and pears and prune grapes after the leaves have fallen. Apply grease bands to protect against winter moth. Spray peaches and nectarines against peach leaf curl.

Lift and divide Rhubarb crowns. Protect with straw to encourage early growth.

Start thinking about your seed order for next year. I can thoroughly recommend Marshalls and have used them for years.

GREENHOUSE

Fix bubble wrap inside glass houses for insulation and check your heaters are working. Reduce watering and feeding.

Sow lettuces ready for harvesting in March.