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www.crabpublishing.co.uk
CRAIL MATTERSW/C 12 June No 18
Free - Donation welcome
Beautiful weather at the Denburn today (Saturday 3 June)but a
pity that so few folk came along to help!June has fairly brought
the growth on and a great variety ofboth wild-flowers and those we
have planted out are at theirbest now. Walking through, one can
hardly miss the sea ofwhite cow parsley but looking a little closer
there are brilliantyellow creeping buttercups and slender wood
avens; pretty
pinks red campion and pink purslane; deep blue columbinesand
paler blue forget-me-nots abounding. In the planted beds
the purple cornflow-ers are doing verywell and are
usuallybuzzing with beeswith other shades ofblue, lilac and
purplepredominating whilevarious coloured fox-
gloves are in bud and will soon burst forth. This Saturday’s
work group concentrated on raking up spentelm flowers and other
debris from the paths, pulling cleavers
(“sticky-willie”) out from among the other plants it was
indanger of strangling, a little more planting and clearing
moresilt from the burn. We were also very kindly offered somemore
gardening tools and another wheelbarrow so there willbe no shortage
of implements should our work-force in-crease.For the foragers
there is still plenty of cleavers left to pull –it is very
palatable when juiced but needs to be picked soonbefore the sticky
seed pods develop when it becomes tougherand more bitter (it is
related to coffee so perhaps the bitter-ness is to be expected).
Elderflowers are starting to emergefor making cordial or drying for
teas (elderflowers are often
combined withdried nettle leafand mint to allevi-ate hayfever
symp-toms). The wildstrawberries are inflower so keepyour eyes out
forthe sweet littlefruits coming soon.Your friendly Den-burn
diggers willbe back clearing,raking, pruningand planting on
thefirst Saturday ofJuly at 10am, docome and join us ifyou like a
spot ofgardening or just
like to get involved with looking after our community
spaces.
Denburn dispatches
URGENT APPEALCrail Matters understands that donations to the
Anstruther FoodBank from the East Neuk community are in such short
supplythat frequently food has to be bought to replenish their
store.This is an awful situation, and one which could be
remediedvery easily by our actions.
Food can be donated by means of the box that Crispin andVanessa
have kindly placed on the floor in front of the counterin the Smoke
Fired Wholefoods shop in the High Street just afew doors away from
the Coop. Richard and his volunteers willthen collect the box when
it is full.
PLEASE HELP
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Doocot Archeological DigLast week the long awaited Doocot
project got underway. On Thursday a team from Addyman archaeology
in Edinburgh joinedour local archaeologists Tom Dawson and Jo
Hambly to explore the ground around the Doocot looking for
artefacts and cluesregarding its construction. They were joined by
the children from Crail Primary School who set about their task
with enormousenthusiasm, finding lots of “treasures” including
pieces of medieval and later pottery, old bottles, marbles, pigeon
bones, claypipes and the top of a bottle of MacDonald and Muir
whisky, which, sadly, had long since parted company with its bottle
andcontents, but still caused some excitement with its local
connections. The children obviously enjoyed their day and it was
grat-ifying to see that many of them brought their parents to the
dig over the weekend to continue their investigations. We may
wellhave a young Indiana Jones in our midst!The work continued over
the next three days and several volunteers, both residents and
tourists helped with the dig. The topsoilon the north side of the
Doocot was removed and revealed that the bedrock had been levelled
prior to the building of the Doocotand a drainage trench had been
excavated two feet back from the wall of the Doocot which was found
to continue around thewest side, presumably for drainage during
construction. It is of interest that in their plans for the Doocot
restoration, our architectshave included a drainage channel in
exactly the same position! They knew a thing or two 500 years ago!
The other interestingfind was a circular hole cut into the centre
of the floor of the Doocot which is almost certainly the foundation
for a potenceladder – a rotating ladder from which chicks and eggs
could be collected. There had been some dispute about whether the
PrioryDoocot had ever had such a ladder, but this finding appears
to prove that it did.The ground has all been refilled now as we
await final confirmation from our main funders Historic Environment
Scotland andThe Heritage Lottery Fund that we can start work on the
main project. Hopefully that will be before the end of June. SY
Include MeInclude Me is a unique North East Fife charityseeking
kind-hearted volunteers to help give avoice to some of the area’s
most vulnerable peo-ple.Include Me matches volunteers with people
who
have a learning or physical disability, chronic illness, or
men-tal health issues so that they can play as full a part as
possiblein the life of their local community. Volunteers don’t need
any formal qualifications, just a mini-mum of two to three hours a
month to spare and a belief in so-cial justice and equality.If you
are interested in finding out more please have a lookat our website
www.includeme.orgTel: 01334 656242 or email:
[email protected]
Crail Primary SchoolAnnual Summer Fair
Crail School Parent Council fundraising group are holdingthe
annual school summer fair on 17th June in Beechwalkpark from 2-4pm.
There will be lots of exciting stalls, fan-tastic raffle prizes,
refreshments and games to keep all en-tertained! We will also be
having a performance from ourschool Glee club who last week came
first in the Fife finalin the Alhambra theatre! Not to be
missed!The school King And Queen will also be crowned. Ofcourse,
holding the event in the park is weather permittingand if
conditions are poor we will be in the CommunityHall.
Funding Crail MattersWe depend on your support to keep producing
Crail Matters. If you enjoy reading what we produce and wish to
make a dona-tion, then please contact [email protected] for
details of our account for bank transfers, or contact a member of
the Ed-itorial Team
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Crail History Society7.30pm, Tuesday, 13 June 2017 British
Legion Hall, Nethergate.
A talk will be given by Dr Kelsey Williams from Stirling
Univer-sity. He will be talking about the Mural Monuments in Crail
Kirkyard, which are in a very poor condition, in serious danger of
col-lapse and what will happen to them if they are allowed to
deterio-rate any further. He will emphasise their importance,
history andhistorical value. The aim is to raise awareness in the
community ofthe monuments as not many people will know about them,
and tofind some way of saving them.Hopefully we will have a really
good turnout as they are such animportant part of Crail's
history.
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WILD CRAILWill Cresswell,
with Photographs by John AndersonI spent an hour on the 3rd sat
on the edge of the wheat fieldlooking to confirm whether the yellow
wagtails were breed-ing successfully. It wassurreal just looking
outover the uniform sea ofgreen punctuated by onlya couple of
bright redpoppies, particularlywhen the haar rolled inand left
nothing else visi-ble. It focussed me on thefield. And what do
yousee in an hour of just watching an intensive wheat field in
theEast Neuk? Not a great deal – a few bumble bees, the occa-sional
swallow passing over and a few nesting pairs of sky-larks and
meadow pipits launching themselves up for songflights or hovering
over the wheat briefly before descendingto their nests. I also had
a corn bunting, a pair of linnets, aherring gull and an
oystercatcher fly over. Just three speciesin an hour using the
field (four if you count the wagtails –but I will come to them).
Not a lot to distract me as I lookedfor the wagtails. After about
20 minutes I heard one flying into the bit of field where I think
they are nesting, it circledaround and then came closer to perch on
the wheat about 50meters from me – the male, checking me out I
think – beforereturning to the likely nest site much further in the
field(about 100 meters away from where I was sitting). Thenevery 10
minutes or so I would hear a bird flying over eitheraway or to this
bit of field, occasionally I would glimpse thembut even without the
haar the trips in and out were inconspic-uous and quick. I saw the
pair come up together from theplace where they were flying to on
one occasion and followedthe female a bit along the adjacent mud
track as it collectedfood (although I couldn’t clinch a good view
of a beakful offood being carried to really confirm it had a nest
full ofchicks). But they must be breeding and likely have
chicks.The next day I was emailed by another birder who had
defi-nitely seen the male carrying food. The first yellow
wagtailnest in Fife for many years. I hope the very heavy rain of
theend of last week didn’t affect its continued success.
The shore north of Balcomie Beach still has lots of waders
coming and going.On the 4th there were35 sanderling, 20dunlin,
15 turnstoneand a couple ofwhimbrel. Some ofthe sanderling
anddunlin were barelyout of winter plumageand must be non-breeders
this year butmost looked like they were going to the party rather
thanstaying at home. Again all ridiculously tame, landing on
thehigh tideline to feed only 15 meters away from me. Sander-ling
make a soft “zwick” call which doesn’t carry far but theywere so
close and calling constantly that the main back-ground sound on the
beach was a gentle clicking. That andthe disgruntled churring of
the juvenile starlings trying tocoax another meal from the parents
they are still chasing.They are forming juvenile flocks now,
probably to their par-ent’s great relief, and are heading off
independently along theshore to feed among the rich piles of
rotting seaweed.
The rainy season in Crail seems to have started with as muchrain
at the end of last week as we had in the whole of April.It has made
the sea watching much better though with no heathaze and clear
visibility all the way to the Lothians. Lots ofpuffins are coming
past Crail now. They will be chick feedingnow and very busyfor the
next twomonths. I saw myfirst great skua of theyear passing the
MayIsland last Wednesdayevening, heading outof the Forth: a longway
out but distinc-tive nonetheless –huge, dark and heavy.A reminder
that thesummer is progress-ing.
Dunlin
Yellow Wagtail
Great Skua
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Crail KirkThank you to all who generously donated during
Christian Aid Week. The sum of £454 was collected which has been
forwardedto Christian Aid. Some of this came from the Christian Aid
Quiz . Several correct papers were handed in and there had to be
adraw. The winner of the draw was Mrs Mgt. Dobbie. Thank you to all
who took part and if you are still struggling over ananswer get it
touch and I (Diana Brown 451790) will put you out of your
misery.
A huge thank you to everyone who supported Mandy Guthrie running
the Edinburgh Half Marathon recently for Church funds.The total
raised was £1160. If anyone has outstanding sponsor money to pay,
please see Mandy Guthrie
Crail Museum and Heritage CentreCoffee MorningSaturday 24th June
201710amBritish Legion HallHome Baking, Preserves, RaffleAdmission
£2
A Scottish Charitable Incorporated Organisation (Charity No.
SC023505)
Crail and Kingsbarns Branch RNLI Crail and Kingsbarns Branch
RNLI
Coffee morning Saturday 17th June
10am Town hall. All usual stalls.Every one welcome
Crail Food Festival
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Foot Stompin' SupperWe were fortunate this weekend to visit our
family in time for the Crail Food Festival. As a familytreat on
Saturday we decided to go to the Foot Stompin' Supper at the Crail
Community Hall forwhat proved to be a delightful evening of food,
music and entertainment.
When we arrived the Producer's Market had been replaced with
shared tables set up around thehall. Wine was served while we
waited for the event to begin. The meal started out with artisan
bread from Barnett's Bakery, ac-companying vegetable chowder before
a hearty buffet dinner of chilli pot and pulled pork burgers. The
meal was finished offwith a delicious scoop of gin soaked icecream
from Jannettas Gelateria.
The mealtime quiz was a great icebreaker for our table (though
completely impossible for us - I still couldn't tell you what the"J
B" in J B Penman Butchers stands for) but the six tables that tied
for first place clearly didn't share our problems! My onlyregret is
that we didn't buy more raffle tickets: the prizes including food
hampers and meals out in the area really were exceptional.The
absolute highlight of the evening was the music, starting with the
artists who played throughout the meal and culminatingwith The
Taysliders, whose music took over the hall with a combination of
traditional songs and rhythm and blues. The danceswere the icing on
the cake of what was already a really enjoyable night.
We had a fantastic time at the Foot Stompin' Supper, even if our
group brought more enthusiasm than skill to the dances. Thefood was
tasty, the music great and the Community Hall a perfect venue. It
gave us an opportunity to meet some really interestingpeople and
join in with everyone, and Crail Food Festival should be
congratulated for putting together such a fun event. We lookforward
to returning for dinner next year!
Cat Thomas
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Crail Food Festival
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ROYAL BURGH OF CRAIL AND DISTRICT COMMUNITY COUNCIL NOTES
Road RepairsIn response to the request for further information
on poor road repairs, a number of readers have replied sending
indetails including photographs. Thus far West Braes, Lamont
Terrace, and the A917 between Crail and Kingsbarnshave been
identified as areas of particular concern. The Community Council
will compile these into a document tosend to Fife Council. Please
continue to send details in ([email protected]) so
that we can presentas comprehensive a report as possible.
Crail Churchyard and the Mural MonumentsThe Community Council
was informed that before any remedial action can be taken on the
Mural Monuments, aConservation Statement is necessary. The
Conservation statement is an important part of the process for
developinga conservation plan and making submissions for funding.
The statement should identify which aspects of the site andits
setting are significant and why, and establish a set of rules or
parameters for the project. This can then be carriedforward into
The Conservation Management Plan, which provides greater detail on
the significance of the MuralMonuments, assesses the impact of the
proposed conversion project on its significance and explains how it
will beprotected - both throughout the conversion process and after
it is finished. Producing an effective Conservation State-ment will
be costly, and the Community Council will fully support the
Preservation Society to raise funds for this,and in the subsequent
conservation project.
Tree Removal Roome Bay AvenueFurther to the recent footway works
at Roome Bay Avenue, Fife Council Trans-portation were contacted by
the owner of Avoncliffe, Roome Bay concerned thata tree within the
footway was causing damage to the boundary wall of his prop-erty.
As requested the owner submitted a report from a structural
engineer sub-stantiating this claim. Fife Council have upheld the
request to remove the tree(marked red on the map) within the
footway on Roome Bay Avenue because rootsare causing damage to an
adjacent property. Fife Council Tree Officer has offeredthe view
the offending roots could not be removed without resulting in
destabil-isation of the tree. It is also proposed the tree shown
yellow (and marked) on theplan is re-shaped to improve the
effectiveness of the street lamp within its canopy.If you have any
views on this, please contact the Community Council
at:[email protected]
Benches at Roome BayIts very sad to see the deterioration of
some of the commemorative benches at Roome Bay. These benches are
popular withvisitors and very well used in summers. Two benches in
particular are in a poor state - one is falling apart, and the
other badlyneeds painting and maintenance, or it too may further
deteriorate. It is not clear who has responsibility for their
maintenance,but perhaps if there are any relatives of those
commemorated in Crail, they could respond.
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The CrailSeagull
An eye on our world
What dreadful weather we have had. After all the sun, whenyou
might be forgiven for thinking summer had arrived, weare back to
rain, cold and winds. I went for a jaunt betweenthe showers to
Kingsbarns to see what was happening. Signsare still up for the
Women’s Golf competition, so it lookslike nothing has changed. To
be expected really I suppose.Even my little friends there seem not
to have heard anythingfurther about the road and coastal path
closures. Have youheard anything?
One thing the rain does is to make the poor state of the
roadseven more obvious. Coming back from Kingsbarns I sawwhat
looked like flooding at a place where I’m sure I remem-ber Fife
Council workmen digging up and repairing the road.Do you think
making ineffective repairs is deliberate policyto keep the work
flowing? I’m thankful I don’t pay CouncilTax on my nests.
Are you fed up with the all the elections, and the threats
ofeven more referendums? Several of my small friends in Mar-ketgate
and Nethergate (and even one in Bow Butts) saidthey wanted to
establish a ‘Circle Poo Party’ to fight againstit all. Might just
catch on. I’d let them use my nest at FlukeDub as a base if they
get going.
I hear the Licence enforcement people went to the
FestivalSupper. I wonder who sent them and why.
Material for inclusion in Crail Matters should be sent to
[email protected] and received on Friday middaybefore
publication. We reserve the right to edit copy for length and
style. Submission does not guarantee inclusion.
© Crab Publishing 2017: Editorial Team this week: Graham
Anderson, Julie Middleton, Isla Reid, ValenciaSowry, Max Taylor,
John Wilson
Short Story CompetitionThe closing date for entries to the Short
Story Competition is now over, and we have received 5 entries from
our readers. Wethink this is a terrific response, especially given
that this is a new venture; the quality is very high and we look
forward to sharingthe stories with you. Entries will now be looked
at by our judges, and we are delighted to announce that Francesca
Kay hasagreed to join us as a judge. Francesca’s first novel, An
Equal Stillness, won the Orange Award for New Writers, and her
secondnovel, Translation of the Bones, was long-listed for the
Baileys Women’s Prize for Fiction. Her new novel, The Long Room,
waspublished by Faber in 2016. We are very fortunate in having
Francesca as a judge.We are also delighted to note that Crail
Primary School have also been involved in the development of
creative writing skills inits pupils, and a member of Crail Matters
Editorial Team was invited to help judge the School’s entry to the
Microsoft FamousFive Sway competition. This competition is open to
every UK Year 4 and Primary 5 Class, and is based on the Enid
Blytonstories, but developed around a place of local interest. It
uses Microsoft's SWAY software, that enables both written and
visualmaterial to be combined. The quality of the work that was
produced by the pupils was terrific, and the children should be
enor-mously proud of what they have achieved; that quality is also
a measure of highly effective teaching. Their stories were
creativeand imaginative, and the children showed a real awareness
of Crail and its environs. Only a single entry per school is
allowed,so it was with great difficulty that one entry was
eventually arrived at to submit. We wish the School, and the
budding young au-thors, every success. Crail Matters hopes in the
new academic year to develop a writing initiative with the School
to help takeforward the very evident skills and talent there.
Crail Preservation Society-King Creosote Concert
Last Saturday, Kenny An-derson (AKA King Cre-osote) gave a great
concertin the Town Hall, enjoyedby all. Thanks to his gen-erosity,
£900 was raised forthe Doocot restoration fund.His recent albums
‘Astro-nauts Meets Appleman’ wasreleased by Domino inSeptember
2016, and “KingCreosote and the Queens ofBrush County’ was
releasedby fence also in 2016.
Planning Applications- Display of one internally illuminated ATM
fascia sign - 31Marketgate North Marketgate Crail Anstruther Fife
KY10 3UG
- External alterations including installation of ATM - 31
Market-gate North Marketgate Crail Anstruther Fife KY10 3UG
NOTEThis is an application for Listed Building Consent for the
RBSbranch at Marketgate, Crail. As this branch is currently
closedRBS are retaining the existing ATM in the branch for public
usein the community so that its customers can withdraw cash,
checktheir balance and access other account services free of
charge. Asthis unit will be a standalone ATM no longer inside the
bank, theproposal is to install a Bastion unit around the ATM. This
is thebest option as it will allow for the ATM to be serviced but
willtake the minimum space as the unit is retractable.