Open Gardens coming soon: buy your programme more cheaply in advance.

Congratulations to Charles Usher - World Champion Silver Medal Winner

Charles is second from left.

Those who remember Charles from his days as Manager of St. Mark's Children's Home will be pleased to hear of his recent success in the Table Tennis World Championships in New Zealand. He and his partner Alf Perry won silver in the men's Over-85 doubles. He and Rosemary were in New Zealand on what Rosemary probably thought was a holiday.

The 50-strong VETTS contingent were among 1,600 players from 60 countries who competed in age categories from Over-40 to Over-85.

Next Parish Council 30th June

The next meeting of Natland Parish Council will take place at the Village Hall at 7.30pm on Monday 30 June please follow link to AGENDA.

Songs of Praise on Village Green next Sunday

W.I. Report for June

       Guest speaker, Ian Potts enthralled members of Natland and Oxenholme W.I. with humorous tales of his life as a musician. Joining the Army as a boy Soldier, he was given a clarinet to play in the band, and continued in life with an orchestral career. He illustrated his talk by playing well known tunes on his clarinet ending with Acker Bilk's Stranger on the shore, to much applause. He was thanked by Doris Aldworth. The competition for a musical box was won by Caroline Lawson, second Lynn Pritchard.

     Helen Davison, representing our area at the National A.G.M. sent a written report of the event which our secretary read out to members. Marion Thornton and Sylvia Shaw had also attended the meeting in Leeds.
      A Beading course at Denman College had been enjoyed by Joan Airey.

      A Summer evening outing to Holehird, followed by a supper in Staveley has been arranged for Wednesday 16th July. Members please contact our secretary if you need more details.

     Next meeting in the Village hall, Natland is on Wednesday August 20th at 7.30pm. 'Gardening for Everyone,'  speaker Les Foden.

     Visitors welcome.

Police are investigating a spate of rural burglaries in the South Cumbria area that have occurred in the past week.

Between 11.50pm on the 14th June and 00.30am on the 15th June there was an attempted burglary at the Kirkby Lonsdale Golf Club. Offenders came equipped and gained entry to a garage damaging two padlocks in the process. Once entry was gained the offenders have not stolen anything. The alarm was activated and the offenders made off.

A Makita petrol driven hand stone saw was stolen between 6pm on the 15th June and 7.30am on the 16th June from a property at Elterwater. This was after offenders gained access to a warehouse building.

Between 4pm on the 13th June and 9.30am on the 17th June offenders gained entry to a property on Black Lane, Sedbergh. Once inside offenders stole 25 litres of diesel, however failed in their attempt to steal a mini digger.

Two Honda quadbikes, an Ifor Williams trailer and 20 litres of petrol were stolen from a property at Kearstwick, Carnforth. The burglary occurred sometime between 12.15pm and 1.20pm on the 18th June.

Detective Inspector Amanda Sadler said: “At this time there is no evidence to suggest that these four incidents are linked however we appeal for anyone with any information to get in touch to help in our enquiries.

“I’d also like to take this opportunity to remind those in rural areas to make sure properties are secured and that expensive equipment is not left in the view of thieves. Due to the value of the equipment often found on farms and the lack of security that can sometimes be in place thieves target rural areas. Simple prevention steps can help in making sure that you don’t become a victim of crime.”

Anyone with any information into any of the incidents is asked to contact Police on 101 and ask to speak to an officer from Barrow CID.

Suspicious Meter Readers

This is a message from Cumbria Constabulary.
We have had a report of a male reading a meter with no ID in the Milnthorpe area.
Please ensure you report any suspicious callers/meter readers by calling 101, and always ask for their ID

Citizens Advice Update

From today, 13 June 2014, the Citizens Advice Consumer Service have amended their telephone number from 08454 04 05 06 to 03454 04 05 06.  This change will make it cheaper or free for many clients to call them, particularly those calling from mobile phones.

Trading Standards can be contacted via the Citizens Advice Consumer Helpline on 03454 04 05 06 or by visiting www.adviceguide.org.uk

Follow us on twitter at www.twitter.com/cumbriats or join us on Facebook at www.facebook.com/cumbriats

Natland hits Black Gold

IS THIS PROOF THAT THE LONG LOST, AND EVEN FABLED, NATLAND TREACLE MINES HAVE BEEN FOUND IN THE CHURCH YARD?

Reporter: Mr Mo Lasses

There have been reports that recent road works and drain clearance operations around the Church Yard have disturbed a recently unknown and untapped reservoir of famous Natland treacle. Drainage operatives from JG Mason and Son were surprised to find their exploratory holes, intended to access blocked surface water drains, filling up with a black viscous liquid when they started to pump water into the drainage system.

An expert on Natland Treacle explained “…that the vibrations from recent ground works must have

A surprised operative and a hole

weakened the ground enough for the water from the drain clearance to penetrate the earth, allowing the pressurised Treacle to burst upwards”. He went on to say “Pressurised treacle can be very dangerous if not handled properly, as the high pressure can produce high temperatures which, on contact with skin, can cause serious sugar burns”.

The history of the Natland Treacle Mines is long and clouded in mystery. The Victorians tried to map the area between the Helm and the River Kent but the exact location of the treacle mines was never recorded. The only surviving evidence of the Treacle mines is a single Treacle miners cart and a delivery tricycle.

This unforeseen discovery is undoubtedly going to renew the interest in the Treacle Mines and the possibility of speculation over whether a small exploratory mine should be opened to assess whether this could be a new Treacle age for Natland.

For now the location of the well has been recorded and, with help of the local Treacle Expert, the well has been safely plugged. It can be reported that this measure, along with the drainage work to stop water from the roof eroding the foundations, will keep the foundations of the Church sound and solid for another 100 years. JG Mason & Son will be continuing with the drain clearing operation to ensure the church drains are in working order before any summer rains arrive.  

Garden Open Day Sunday 13 July

Two years ago on a cold wet Sunday £1,400 was raised for the Church and £400 for the village hall. This year we will have 18 gardens open, and with a fine sunny day forecast we hope to improve on the attendance and on the income for both organisations.

We have gardens in the village centre, Longmeadow, at Cracalt and off the A65 Burton Road. The gardens will be open from 11.30am until 5.00pm. Programmes will be on sale later this month in advance at £3.00 from Natland and Oxenholme Post Offices or in church on Sundays. Admission on the day will be £4.00 at the Church door.

Refreshments will be available in the village hall from 12.00noon to 4.30pm with proceeds from refreshments going to the village hall.

We are in need of help. If you can bake a cake for teas, offer a few hours on the day to meet and greet or sell programmes or help in any other way please speak to Collin Mansfield (07740 447858; collin4mansfield@homecall.co.uk), Audrey Ireland, David Walker, Jennifer Ball or Rhian Peters.

Pre-school Open Morning on Friday

Grants available for local groups

Cumbria County Council makes grants available in your area through the South Westmorland Neighbourhood Forum, funding is available to support community projects organised and run by voluntary, not for profit and community groups which will benefit the local area.  Ideally groups should be locally based and undertaking their own fund-raising to complement the project.

Grants have previously been awarded to a wide range of community and voluntary organisations including playgroups, sports groups, youth clubs, environmental groups and community halls.  The majority of grants tend to support the purchase of equipment or refurbishment works. If you have a project in mind or would like to find out more please contact Kelly Alty on 01539 713447 or email kelly.alty@cumbria.gov.uk.

Time to tackle traffic issues in the parish

Having published the Parish Directory and got the Annual Parish Meeting out of the way in May, the new Parish Council is keen to start getting the Parish Plan 2014 Working Groups up and running.

We’re starting by holding a meeting to launch the Traffic & Footpaths Working Group at 7.30pm on Wednesday 25 June at the Village Hall and anyone with an interest in traffic, parking and footpaths issues in the parish, and a desire to do something about them, is welcome to come along.

There’s no set agenda. We just want to find out which issues you are interested in – new footways, cycle lanes or pedestrian crossings at danger points? more parking or stronger parking restrictions? lower speed limits? – and how you would like to pursue them. There’s plenty to get our teeth into.

Please come along if you can – and if you can’t but would like to be kept in touch with future activity please drop me a quick email to let me know on lois.sparling@gmail.com.

Church Summer Fete

Room for one more on the Parish Council

The May meeting of the Parish Council was rather a small gathering, now that we have only 5 elected councillors, two of whom were unfortunately unable to be present at the first meeting of the Council’s year. (Click here for the full minutes.)

All the same a new Chair has now been elected. David Peters is standing down from the position after 10 years’ dedicated service and Lois Sparling, who joined the council in 2012, is taking over.

We also made some more progress on the Parish Plan, agreeing to hold public meetings to launch the Traffic & Footpaths and Community Energy working groups as soon as suitable dates can be found (and before the summer holidays). If you signed up for either of these groups you can expect to be contacted very soon – and if you didn’t but would like to take part, please look out for more news on this website. We will also be taking steps early in July to find the best way of linking our pool of willing volunteers to current opportunities in the parish. Watch out for more on that, too.

In the meantime we still have one place to fill on the new Parish Council. Do you know anyone who might be interested? We have had one person come forward since the elections and we hope to be able to co-opt him into one of the two vacant positions at the June meeting but there is room for one more. Please email Lois (Chair) if you would like to find out more about what the job entails.

It would be great to have our full complement of seven councillors to help us put the new Parish Plan into action.

Beware Computer viruses

An article in The Times on 3 June warns that the UK 'has a "two-week period"' in which to protect itself from a computer virus that could give hackers access to sensitive information that could cost the country millions of pounds'.

The National Crime Agency encourages anyone who uses the Internet, to protect themselves against powerful malicious software by making sure that their anti-virus software is up-to-date and by running scans to ensure that all applications are running correctly. 

The viruses in question are known as GOZeus and CrytoLocker. The first hides in email attachments that give access to hackers. The second virus activates if no valuable data are found using the first virus, and it effectively locks the computer, demanding a ransom to unlock it. 

As well as taking the action advised by the NCA above, avoid clicking on email attachments in the coming weeks, unless you know they are from a safe (and scanned!) source.

Be safe!

As one hole closes another one opens

Though the diversion signs are still up this morning, the hole in the road outside Compton House is now filled and finished. Meanwhile across the green, Masons of Endmoor are opening another hole in the churchyard outside the vestry to remedy the failed drains which are damaging the church foundations. The whole area outside the vestry has been a quagmire after rain for some years and there is a danger than the foundations will be undermined by soil washing away. It is hoped that action now will avoid big expensive problems in years to come. Great care is being taken to protect the greensward while the works continue.

The Wrong Way!!!

Sent in by - John Fisher

The 200 Club winners for June are:

1st           18           G Cummins
2nd          75           T Goddard
3rd           37           C Payne

Why is the Road Closed near the Post Office?

It seems as if this is the responsibility of United Utilities who are doing something to the water supply to the Village Hall. Latest reports suggest that the presence of a gas pipe has interrupted proceedings.

Pro Nobis Concert

The 45th Anniversary Concert of this Natland based singing group will be in the Parish Church in Kendal on this occasion, so that more people can be seated.

May weather statistics for Natland

				2014		2013
Temperature at 8am				9.6c		9.3c
Average minimum temp.				8.2c		6.7c
Average maximum temp.				13.3c		15.0c
			mm	in	mm	in
Rainfall			83	3.3	69	2.8
Another fairly average month. Unusually we seem to have done better than the East side of the country.
John Dobson