The Museum will be open 3 days a week during August 2024 i.e. Tuesday, Wednesday and Saturday (except 3rd and 31st) 10am-4pm

See the Poster for all dates. FREE ENTRY – Donations welcome.

(Click poster to enlarge.)

Saturday 13th July 2024, 2:15 for a 2:30pm start

This talk is in-house and online.

***BOOKING ESSENTIAL***

CLICK HERE to book your place(s).

Jasmina will share stories about Dr Jane’s life and her reasons for hope, and why she believes that it is up to each one of us to decide the kind of difference we make with our daily decisions and actions.

About the Presenter: Jasmina Georgovska
The Jane Goodall Institute UK
Jasmina has been working for the Jane Goodall Institute UK since 2009. Inspired by Dr Jane Goodall, she wanted to contribute towards making a positive change via working with schools and young people in the UK. In the last 15 years, she’s learnt that through action we can change this world, and by working together we can create positive waves. Teachers, educators and volunteers are pivotal in spreading the word and in inspiring and encouraging the young generation to understand, respect and care for our home, this planet.
Jasmina is seeing increased awareness nowadays, and just like Dr Jane, she has hope for the future in the hands of compassionate people of any age.

About Dr. Jane Goodall
Dr. Jane Goodall, DBE, Founder of the Jane Goodall Institute and UN Messenger of Peace is a world-renowned ethologist and activist inspiring greater understanding and action on behalf of the natural world every single day. Dr Goodall is best known for groundbreaking studies of wild chimpanzees in Gombe Stream National Park, Tanzania, transformative research that continues to this day as the longest-running wild chimpanzee study in the world. Dr. Goodall is the founder of the Jane Goodall Institute, a global conservation, advocacy, animal welfare, research, and youth empowerment organization, including her global Roots & Shoots programme. Jane has worked extensively on climate action, human rights, conservation, and animal welfare issues for decades, and continues to be a central voice in the work to advance environmental progress.

Continue reading “Dr Jane Goodall, DBE- her life, work and legacy” →

Members of the Bournemouth Natural Science Society (BNSS) created Birthday cards for Dr Jane’s 90th Birthday. And a beautiful Jane Goodall Rose bush will be planted in the BNSS gardens to honour Jane Goodall’s 90th Birthday. Happy 90th Birthday Dr Jane from everyone at BNSS!

Read Birthday cards from the Bournemouth Natural Science Society for Dr Jane for her 90th! in full

(Posted in Mission Updates by Chief Agent Georgovska on Mar 28, 2024 12:41 pm)

Many members watched Glynn Gorick’s BNSS Zoom presentation on the 21st November in which he discussed his wonderful artworks. These were produced for scientists and many environmental organisations. Those wishing to see more of his images can find them HERE.

BNSS Members may wish to become involved in a research project at Bournemouth University. Two PhD students are looking for volunteers for an ethically approved study supervised by Professor Hana Burianova and Dr Ala Yankouskaya. This healthy ageing research involves younger and older adults undergoing tests and MRI scans. More information and contact information is available here.

Following the Dr Sophia D. AMENYAH’s talk on 11th March she provides us with some information about events:

Healthy Life Healthy Brain Project

• Date: Wednesday 26th April 2023
• Time: 5-7pm
• Venue: Bournemouth Gateway Building, St Pauls Lane, Bournemouth, BH8 8GP
• Refreshments will be provided
• We will share our experiences of the project and our key findings

Register for the event here

ADRC virtual coffee mornings

2nd Wednesday of the month

online via Zoom

10.00-11-00

A different presenter each month

Topics on healthier ageing and conditions that affect ageing

Q & A

Everyone welcome

Further Information or to book a place email adrc@bournemouth.ac.uk or phone 01202 962526

Link to Sophia’s March 11th talk here

This summer Jill Abbot entered the BNSS Garden into Bournemouth in Bloom Competition. At the October presentations we were gratified to be awarded Tree of Excellence grading for our three tree submissions: our Loquat for Small Ornamental or Flowering Tree; our Tulip Tree for Champion Tree – notable for sheer size, age or heritage value, or an example of an uncommon species; our Sweet Chestnut for Tree Contributing to Bio-diversity – good for bees or provider of habitat or food source for bats, birds or mammals.

The latter actually won a trophy and plaque as the Overall Winner in the category.

We were also presented with a Gold Award for our back garden in the Environmentally Friendly Spaces category.

Following the recent talk here are a number of links which may be of interest.

Recycling Video – https://youtu.be/8DAk8m7sVM4

Bournemouth Repair Café – Bournemouth Repair Cafe – Transition Bournemouth (wordpress.com)

Win on Waste – We’re winning on waste (winonwaste.org)

Dorset Scrapstore – Dorset Scrapstore For All Your Crafting Needs

BCP Council Recycling – Bins, waste and recycling (bcpcouncil.gov.uk)

Consistency in collections –  Consistency in collections | WRAP

Following on from our recent talk the following may be of interest.

Find out more and help conserve the smooth snake by:​

• Buying your copy of ARC’s children’s story book: https://www.arc-trust.org/shop/in-search-of-old-uncle-blue
• Reading about the project: arc-trust.org/snakes-in-the-heather​
• Volunteering with ARC: arc-trust.org/volunteering-with-arc​
• Becoming an ARC member: arc-trust.org/join​
• Signing-up to ARC eNews: arc-trust.org/arc-enews​
• Sponsoring the smooth snake: arc-trust.org/sponsor-smooth-snakes​
• Following ARC on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Linkedinand YouTube​

How about this for a guided walk?

 Event type: Guided walk of Parley Common Nature Reserve

• Date: Thursday 26^th May
• Start time: 10:00am
• End time: 12:30 pm
• Meeting point details: Meeting at the Centre, Ferndown. Address: Barns Road, Ferndown, BH22 8XH. The Centre is a community centre adjacent to Parley Common and we will meet in the car park.
• What to bring: Stout footwear and trousers suitable for walking on ground that may be uneven at times; clothes appropriate for the weather conditions; sun cream; water and any snacks you may want!
• Contact number: Owain: 07388 948442. Please ring me if you are running late on the day.

This walk will be a slow paced walk stopping to look at features of the heathland habitat as we talk through it. Maximum 12 spaces.

Those of you who enjoyed John Hubbard’s Zoom talk on “Village Vernacular” on the 30th of November may wish to follow up this interesting architectural topic. We are grateful for John sharing the source of his illustrations and references below:

ILLUSTRATIONS

Images of villages from the early twentieth century can be found on the Facebook group ‘Dorset Past in Pictures’.

Other black and white images are taken from the Royal Commission on Historical Monuments Dorset volumes and have been used where tree growth has prevented good modern views.

Otherwise, all photographs are by the speaker, with the exception of those of Melbury Sampford and the New Inn, Cerne Abbas.

BOOKS of INTEREST

Dovecot Press series on Dorset

Farmhouses and Cottages by Michael Billett, 2002

Stone Quarrying by Jo Thomas, 1998

General

Illustrated handbook of Vernacular Architecture by R W Brunskill, Faber 1987

The Pattern of Engish Bulding by Alec Clifton-Taylor, Faber 1987

The Stone Mason, a history of building in Britain by Andrew Ziminski, John Murray 2020

Many members will have heard Dr. Rachel Moseley’s illuminating Zoom talk to BNSS “Life through a different lens, the brain science of autism” on Tuesday 26th October. She has kindly provided us with her slides from the talk which members who attended, and those who didn’t, may wish to see. The final slides have many links to resources which may be useful. The file (pdf) can be seen here (it is 4.8 Mbytes in size).

The deadline for the BNSS Photographic competition has been extended until November 30th 2021. Further details here

One of our members Marisa Mann has been selected to show some of her wildlife and ecology paintings at the Affordable Art exhibition in London on behalf of Arts 4 Dementia. Further details here

New Chair of Photography Eleni Dimitriou has launched the 2021 Photographic Competition with 3 categories Plants & Fungi, Landscapes and Wildlife. For full details see poster below.

In a ‘Zoom’ talk in January entitled “From mosquito bites to sniffer dogs” new BNSS member and volunteer, entomologist Dr. Sophie Wulff, gave us insight into the work going on at the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine (LSHTM). She started by describing what is known about how female mosquitoes detect humans in order to obtain their blood meal. She then went on to tell us about experimental work in Africa showing how the malaria parasite which is transmitted by the Anopheles mosquito can change human odour to make mosquitoes more attracted to malaria-infected children and potentially increase transmission. Since dogs have a sense of smell up many times better than us they have begun to be used by scientists to try and detect human diseases by odour. So far, there has been work on certain types of cancer, Type 1 diabetes and recently, and topically, on those infected with Covid-19. She described some ongoing trials involving LSHTM and Durham University (more detail here) and work published from France & Germany. Finland is currently using sniffer dogs at Helsinki airport in a test using swabs from passenger’s skin which takes only one minute (more here).

Dr. Luke Helmer gave an interesting talk via Zoom on trying to re-establish oysters in certain sites in the Solent on Tuesday 22nd September. Those of you who wish to follow up this research and make a contribution to his Virtual London to Monaco bike ride in support of the charity fighting to protect our oceans can use this link Blue Marine Foundation.

As the BNSS is an associate member of the Quekett Microscopy Club, BNSS members are invited to enter either of two competitions as part of Quekex 2020 closing date 10th September 2020. The first competition is “Lockdown Microscopy“. The scope of this exhibition is deliberately wide to encourage as many people as possible to take part. There is no minimum requirement and entries can be as detailed as you choose to include an article, presentation or slideshow. In the second competition, Micrographic Art, the art can take any format. Drawing from microscope image for the purpose of recording as an alternative to photography, a photo, painting, textiles, model etc and should be accompanied by a title and description of the subject. Further details of both competitions here.

The last few weeks has seen two talks with an ‘ecological bent’. First Patrick Abbot described a Green Economic Growth programme in Papua.  Part funded through the UK Government’s Climate Change initiative, it aims to develop sustainable low carbon developments in two Indonesian provinces.  In an area still with 93% forest cover, the Programme is assisting local villagers and small businesses to set up systems for growing and marketing high value produce in a way that is compatible with maintaining the natural forest. In a partnership agreed between the UKCCU and the Indonesian Government, Patrick’s company provides expertise in research, technical assistance and skills development – more information here. Second, Bob Crooks talked about the staggering volumes of e-waste we are all producing and the metals used in electronic devices which we might need to mine rubbish dumps for. It made us all feel guilty about our own e-waste lurking in drawers in our homes – lecture details here

Second year BA (Hons) Fine Art students from the Arts University Bournemouth developed artworks in response to three partner organisations of which BNSS was one. Unfortunately, these did not result in public exhibitions due to the covid-19 pandemic. However, you can see some of student artists’ work here especially in the section on “Contemporary Artefacts” (from Steve Limburn, BNSS Education Officer)

BNSS members have attended two Zoom lectures in the last two weeks on marine subjects and one of our members has submitted a film on lizards.

On 19th May, Mary Thornton gave us a lecture on “Microplastics in Oceans” about the all girl crews researching ocean plastic pollution. This elicited a lively discussion after the lecture which was sadly cut short by deteriorating sound quality. Further information from Mary via contact@bnss.org.uk. However, you can also follow up more about the topic here:

Emily Penn’s TED talk “The body burden of our plastic problem”

On 12th May, Grenham Ireland gave a lecture on “Plankton Stories” describing the many forms of zooplankton and the ways they try to stop being someone else’s lunch. You can follow up with a short video of a ciliated worm larva swimming

Worm larva

and also the super pictures at the Micropolitan Museum

Lizard – Paul Gobier’s video of a wall lizard at Portman ravine

Lizard movie

On Tuesday 14th April BNSS launched its first ‘Zoom’ lecture by

James Fradgley on “How the eye works – an astronomer’s perspective”

followed on 21st April by:

Ashley Leftwich on “Ancient Woodland – What is it, where is it and how do I know I am in it !!”

and then on 28th April by:

Hattie Miles on “Romance and Scandal in Bournemouth and beyond”

The above shows Hattie’s screen during Hattie’s lecture which included this image of Robert Louis Stevenson. We are working on developing a full programme of talks using the Zoom platform and members are receiving emails each week on how to join them. If non-members are interested in joining a lecture, they should email: contact@bnss.org.uk

For those interested in following up some of these topics the following links might be useful:

Eye

Ancient Woodland

Also read about Ashley’s Madagascan find of shell and bone

FOLLOWING ADVICE, THE MUSUEM IS CLOSED TO THE PUBLIC UNTIL FURTHER NOTICE DUE TO THE CURRENT CORONAVIRUS PANDEMIC.