Stories from the Edge - Volunteer Now

efforts have caused a huge rise in the tree population and an even larger rise in public consciousness that saw the beauty in,and the need for, trees. From a miserable two per cent in the early 1980s this has risen to an astonishing six per cent. Itinvolved a backbreaking campaign to plant a massive one million trees. Number one million is planted at the BelfastInternational Airport.Then the volunteers began the Millennium tree campaign involving the wholesale planting of a further 1.6 million trees acrossthe north. Exactly where the Millennium tree is at present, the Conservation Volunteers aren’t so sure. However it won’t behard to find out and then, like the airport tree, a plaque will be put up. Terry Harvey has been one of the most enthusiasticconservationists. He is now middle aged and married to a local woman but becomes as excitable as a young boy talking abouthis work. Terry joined the Conservation Volunteers as an ACE worker. Such workers received wages marginally higher than theweekly Giro cheques sent from the local DHSS but the scheme allowed local community environmental or any other sort ofgroup to afford paid workers for the first time.When his ACE year finished in the early 1990s Terry had no intention of sittingaround the house watching the grass grow under his feet. He continued volunteering as a Conservation Volunteer. Seven yearsago he was asked if he could grow wild flowers and other so called weeds. He said yes not realising he knew nothing aboutparticular requirements of wild flowers. It was a matter of trial and error, study and discussion with everyone from farmersto university academics.His knowledge grew so that now he is considered something of an expert in that particular field … pardoning the pun! In facthe is regularly consulted by academics and is often tasked with sowing wild flowers on some of the most difficult sites thatare a legacy to a thoughtless industrialpast, such as old quarries. He iscurrently studying a limestone pit nearthe Dupont factory in Derry and hasdiscovered that certain species of wildgrass and other so called weeds canbreak down chemical composition ofthe inert limestone waste possiblyturning the no man’s land into a morefertile spot.Terry like many in the farmingcommunity was always aware of thecountryside, its plants and animals andthe need to conserve. He insists he was“he is consideredsomething of an expertin that particular field”never on the conservationsist fringe which hugged trees but the remark isn't meant to be an indictment of that moreeccentric if esoteric minority. There is room for everyone inside conservationism because the movement is not about natureas such but about people and about educating people to respect their environment.His experience has taught him about the need to 'time' plants so that the offspring of various insect species don't hatch withnothing to eat. Plant flowering must be synchronised to mark the birth of insect larvae with its favourite food. "There is no