We have got the exciting opportunity to purchase a prime portion of land in the Triangle here in Kilnsea!
24 November 2020
We have been in discussions over two fields behind Cliff Farm on the west side of the Triangle and are now in a position to progress with the purchase, subject to some fundraising to make it affordable for the Observatory.
2020 has been tough for the Observatory – for much of the year we remained closed and were not able to function at our full potential with events and accommodation. But thanks to the amazing support we have received from our Friends of Spurn and the wider community, we are still able to explore potential land purchase opportunities like this one. We know how hard land can be to come by in our area, so when the opportunity to secure these fields in the Triangle arose, we simply couldn’t turn it down. We have managed to source a substantial amount towards the cost of this land but we just need a small amount of fundraising to get us over the final hurdle.
The land itself is the field immediately adjacent to Cliff Farm, just south of the Kilnsea Road and bordering the Canal on its western edge, and Rose Cottage and Well Field on its eastern edge. This represents 5.5 acres, where we believe we would be able to develop into an amazing field for birds and wildlife!
The sale of this land has not yet been confirmed, but we are very close to being able to secure it. Should, for whatever reason, the sale ‘fall through’ then any money accumulated through the following fundraisers will all be put back into our land bank fund for future land purchases.
We are open to ideas about how to develop this land and will be asking our Friends of Spurn members for consultation, hopefully once we have finalised the purchase. Our initial thoughts are to have a wader scrape in the field, with a hide(s)/screen(s) overlooking it. Our good friend and artist Ray Scally has kindly done the following artist’s impression to show a potential future vision for this parcel of prime birding square-footage.
We’ve teamed up with a whole host of amazing artists who have supported the Observatory with their work in the past, and our highly skilled designer Chris Gaughan from Designwing, to produce a top-quality 2021 calendar. It features 12 pieces of artwork from 10 different artists in A4 landscape format. It has a selection of ‘highlighted features’ throughout the year, noting for example certain weeks that are good for passage of a particular species. It also has the earliest Spurn spring migrant dates and ‘On this Day’ megas from Spurn’s past for inspiration when you are next out in the field.
The artists and their featured work are:
We are offering these calendars at a variety of price ranges. Obviously, they are all the same product but as this is an initiative to raise money of this land purchase, we have given the option to increase your donation whilst still receiving a calendar, so feel free to pick from one of the price point options below to receive both this quality calendar and support this land purchase. This is a ‘pre-sale’ and will last until 13th December so get your orders in before then. They will then be posted out the following week.
Following on from the great success and popularity of our previous auction, we have got another 14 mounted giclee A4 prints from Ian Lewington of the legendary Siberian Accentor from Easington to auction off.
These prints will be auctioned off as previous, with the top 14 bidders all receiving one of these special mounted prints.
This is an online auction, with bids sent to sbotauctions@gmail.com – full instructions below. There is a reserve for each print and they won't be sold unless that reserve is met. You will be notified by email to confirm your bid initially and if you are knocked out of the top 14 bidders, you will be informed of the new 14th highest bid. Please check your junk email to make sure you do not miss these emails!
The auction will run until 17:00hrs on 14th December 2020. Whomever is in the top 14 highest bidders at this point secures one of the prints and will be requested to pay via PayPal/bank transfer/cheque etc.).
Instructions:
1. To place a bid on a print, simply email sbotauctions@gmail.com and state your bid, mentioning it is for a Siberian Accentor print.
2. You will then receive an email to confirm your bid has been received and whether or not you are in the top 14 highest bids. If you do not receive this email please check your junk folder.
3. At the end of the auction we will email all winning bidders to confirm they have won a Siberian Accentor print and arrange postage/payment etc.
Once again, a massive thanks to Ian Lewington for supporting the Observatory in producing and sending us these amazing prints for us to auction off. We are very thankful in these hard times.
We hope you enjoy this auction, please dig deep and help support the Observatory whilst also winning valuable prizes. Any questions about items in the auction can be sent to sbotauctions@gmail.com
We have been very kindly donated a 16 volume set (plus the ‘Special’ volume) of ‘Handbook of the Birds of the World’ and as we don’t have enough space at the Observatory to store this collection, we have decided that an auction raising funds for this land purchase would be the most appropriate way to find them a new home. These are a second hand set in near mint condition, with just some wear on the dust sleeves of volume one and two.
This is a great opportunity to get your hands on the full 16 volumes plus the ‘special volume’ of this hard-to-find set of books. More info on the books can be seen here https://www.lynxeds.com/product/handbook-of-the-birds-of-the-world/
This is an online auction, with bids sent to sbotauctions@gmail.com, full instructions below. There is a reserve for the full set of volumes and they won't be sold unless that reserve is met. You will be notified by email to confirm your bid initially and if you are knocked off the highest bid, you will then be informed of the new highest bid. Please check your junk email to make sure you don't miss these emails!
The auction will run until 18:00hrs on 14th December 2020. Whomever is in the top bidder at this point secures the full 16 volumes (plus the ‘Special’ volume) and will be requested to pay via PayPal/bank transfer/cheque etc.). Due to the size of these books we won’t be able to post them, but should be able to organise delivery at least within Yorkshire/northern England/reasonable distance of Spurn – drop us a question about delivery/collection if you are unsure.
Instructions:
1. To place a bid on a print, simply email sbotauctions@gmail.com and state your bid, mentioning it is for the Handbook of the Birds of the World.
2. You will then receive and email to confirm your bid has been received and whether or not you are the highest bidder. If you do not receive this email please check your junk folder
3. At the end of the auction we will confirm with the winning bidder and arrange delivery/collection and payment etc.
We hope you enjoy this auction, please dig deep and help support the Observatory whilst also winning valuable prizes. Any questions about items in the auction can be sent to sbotauctions@gmail.com
To go alongside the above fundraisers, we are also looking to raise £2000 to finalise the sale of this land. So far, we have been able to draw £7,500 from our Land Bank fund through the regular ‘Securing the Future’ donations that some of out very generous members have accumulated, to add to the cost of this purchase. We understand that many people are going through a very difficult time financially due to the COVID-19 pandemic, which is why we have tried to ensure our fundraising plan has a range of options to get to the target figure to allow us to purchase the Cliff Farm land, with most of the options giving something back to our supporters. Our directors have thought long and hard about ways to raise funds for this land purchase and lots of calculations have gone into the finances, with the outcome that we are likely to still need to raise £2000 to confirm the purchase of this land. We are asking that if you are able to do so, please donate to our final fundraiser here. Many thanks for all the support shown by the birding community and beyond.
You can donate directly through Go Fund Me here
In addition to all of the above we had also already launched a Spurn Warbler A6 card collection, we can now confirm that all proceeds from this product will go straight to the purchase of Cliff Farm land.
With the great help and support of Swallowtail Print, Chris Gaughan at Designwing and our three generous artists: Alan Harris, Tony Disley and Richard Johnson, we are able to offer these great little A6 blank cards.
This is a pack of 9 cards, 3 of each design. The artwork was produced for Spurn Wildlife publications of recent years. They are avaliable to purchase on our shop here for £12.
