Conferencing with the wardens

It was the annual shindig at the Royal Ag for the cotswold wardens, and Glorious Grasslands volunteers are invited along. I picked up Niamh early and we were parked up by 9.30am. We kicked off with some stats and achievements over the last year from the CEO and head warden and then went to the first speaker, Arthur Price. It was obvious from the start that he’s a bit of a force of nature. As well as being a farmer, he’s a significant expert on Cotswold stone and quarring. He gave us a really thorough talk on the history of quarrying around the Cotswolds through the ages. It was packed with facts – too many to remember, but the two takeaways for me were the different types of stone from different depths and also that Nailsworth is one of the most significant quarry areas in the Cotswolds – mostly underground. After the break, we had a Nature Recovery talk from Simon Smith who went through the basics and urgency of what needs to be done across the Cotswolds. It seems as if there is now…