Issue 5 June 2009www.thelancingvillager.co.uk

marine

TITHING TIMES

space for you

Sompting Village Festival5 - 7th JUNE

Events at

SOMPTING RECREATION GROUND,WEST STREET, SOMPTING

(SHAYLERS FAMILY FUNFAIR)

Also at Sompting Community Centre

and Sompting Village Hall

This weekend the Village Fair will havevarious events held on the recreationground, including workshops anddemonstrations from local groups.

Learn about ‘Olde Sompting’ at theSompting Community Centre exhibitionand take a look round the old ‘ReadingRoom’, Sompting Village Hall.

Helping to support our Non-profit making Groups

Summer has arrived at last!

This is a busy time in Lancing andSompting, with both hosting AdurFestival events, bringing the communitytogether for a good time and some muchneeded fundraising for our strugglinggroups.

The Lancing Villager

I hope you enjoy our issue this month.

June and July are ideal months to slap onthe sun lotion and stretch your legs. Whynot try our Butterfly Safari on page 3,while you are exploring our local countryside.

It is a wonderful time in our gardens too,with flowers, fruit and vegetables growing at a terrific rate.

For those with access to a car, I wouldrecommend exploring the many privategardens that open to the public for charity through the National Gardenscheme (NGS). They offer a glimpse of ahuge variety of gardens from large estates, to tiny town gardens. I alwaysfind them inspiring, and the teas are scrummy!The NGS ‘Yellow book’ giving details of allthese gardens is available in most bookshops.

Our thanks go to Martin Hofton in Quebec, Canada for his memories of oldLancing, and inspiring others to recounttheir stories on the Tithing Times websitewww.tithingtimes.wordpress.com

Open Weekend

...next issue available in August

Please continue to send your informationand comments to our website, which willbe regularly updated or call 01903766449.

Enjoy your summer.

22 The Lancing Villager June 2009

May's weather was a mixed bag;sometimes cold, windy, pouring rain,thunderstorms - happily ending on agood note with warm sunshine.

The highlight of the month has undoubtedly been the mass migrationof Painted Lady butterflies, arriving inthe UK around the Bank holiday weekend, having flown from the AtlasMountain region of North Africa,spreading northwards throughoutBritain in the final week of May.

Estimates of numbers vary, but over amillion is quite likely!

On the butterfly discussions forums Imonitor, many people reported steadystreams of the lovely orange and blackmarked insects passing over theirhomes and through gardens, at a rateof up to one a minute in some places,especially here in Southern England.

In our garden in South Lancing, wehad up to 30 butterflies on one dayfeeding themselves on the nectar ofthe three 'Bowles Mauve' perennialWallflower plants we have. Other popular nectar plants are thevarious forms of brassiccas, including the fields of yellow Oil seedrape. The common plant of gardensand shingle, Valerian in its pink or redform also attracted many of the butterflies, urgently needing to replacethe energy giving sugars lost in theirprecarious flight from the continent.

Valerian is very salt tolerant and growsvery well on our shingle beaches, offering a welcome sight to butterfliescrossing the English Channel.

Would you like to write a column ?editor@thelancingvillager.co.uk

A naturalist’s view

The Seadown Singers with Alex Martin (narrator with a long memory) andMarilyn Dennis (pianist with Forgotten Dreams) have put together a programmeof DREAMS AND MEMORIES for their Summer Concert, to be held in conjunctionwith the Adur Festival. ‘Do you remember an inn, Miranda?’’, ‘Ah yes. Iremember it well’, ‘All I have to do is dream’….‘The Impossible Dream’.

Our concerts and refreshments are FREE but we are hoping for generousdonations in aid of the new St Barnabas Hospice building programme inWorthing.

Wednesday 17th June at 7.30pm

Summer Concert - St Peter’s Church Hall, Bowness Avenue, Sompting

Events

Saturday 27th June 10am - 12pm

Open Garden Morning - In aid of NSPCC

15 Rossiter Road, Lancing

Entrance £1 includes tea/coffee & biscuits

Raffle, Strawberry Fayre, NSPCC items

Wednesday 17th June at 7pm - Lancing Health Centre, Penstone Park

Friends of Kingfisher Surgery host

ANJA’S BIKE (in Cuba) + 2 Half Marathons

A slide show and talk with Dr. Anja Goossens, including a presentation of funds to the Spinal Injury Association and

Southwick Multiple Sclerosis Centre

Light refreshments and a raffle will be available

Are you retired or semi-retired but still like to learn new things...?

If so, then you are invited to come along to our monthly meeting on

Tuesday 9th June, 2pmTabernacle Church Hall,

North Road, Lancing

Learn more about our ‘Garden Birds’ from our guest speaker this month, David Golds from the RSPB at Pulborough

Enjoy a walk on one of our Local Nature Reserves at Lancing Ring or Mill Hill, and see ifyou can spot some of our beautiful butterflies.

“How many can you see?”

Ray Hamblett

A Butterfly Safari

Comma

your magazine 3

http://rayhamblett.wordpress.com/nature-notes

Peacock

Small Copper

Marbled White

Orange Tip - male

Speckled WoodSmall White

Small Tortoiseshell

Red Admiral

Wall Brown

Small Heath

Green Veined White

Holly Blue

Painted Lady

Common Blue

Brimstone - female

44 The Lancing Villager June 2009

My plot is on the south facing slopeabove the Leisure Centre where I growas organically as possible.

June - Ups and downsI have a new neighbour, who has takenon a plot next to mine. The plot hadbeen cultivated last season, so is nottoo neglected, but digging compactedsoil now is like digging concrete, and Idon’t envy her the task. Starting withall good intentions, the previous tenants were a young family, who likemany, hadn’t the time or energy to getthe best out of it. But at least theygave it a go!

Rabbits seem to be a problem thisyear, with crops disappearing overnight, chewed away to nothing. Runnerbeans, carrots and cabbage have allsuffered. This is the first time I haveheard of the problem on the top of thesite in the years I have been there.

On a positive note; my peas are flowering and producing their first podsand my autumn onion sets are fat andwill soon be dying back. The straw-berries are flowering well and the fruit filling out, so I have netted themagainst hungry birds.

I am content with my efforts so far,and enjoy the ‘cottagey’ feel of myplot. I like to provide the insects and butterflies with plenty of food too, withbrightly coloured Sweet Williams andflowering Chives bringing them to theplot. This is my way of encouragingand thanking them for their hard work.

I took my first lettuce (Tom Thumb)from the plot recently and planted mytomato plants; so for me, summer isreally here. The birds are singing andthe evenings are light enough to potterlate, life is good.

What are you up to? Join in my blog at www.uptheplot.wordpress.com

sweet little pods

Adur Petanque Club

“Come & Try”

The South Downs Society are running aFestival of Walks to celebrate the comingof the South Downs National Park.

The walks will explore the huge variety ofbeautiful landscapes in the National Parkarea, and will run until mid summer. Thewalks are free and everyone is welcometo come along.

Jacquetta Fewster, Director of the SouthDowns Society, said “It is wonderful newsthat the South Downs are to become aNational Park. What better way tocelebrate, and learn more about ourbrand-new National Park, than to join usfor one of our Festival walks?”

“From the Seven Sisters in the East, toOld Winchester Hill in the West, and manypoints in between, the walks will take inhundreds of viewpoints and lesser-knowngems as well. We’ll explore beautiful wildflower hay meadows, woodlands bursting

with birdsong, heaths, and springy chalkhills dotted with orchids. There are somany stunning areas waiting to bediscovered.”

Other features on the walks include aWorld War Two tank, a farm tour, a visit tothe Devil’s Jumps and other prehistoricsites, the oldest building in Brighton andplaces linked to the famous naturalistGilbert White and the Bloomsbury Groupauthors.

The Festival includes some shorter strollsas well as longer, challenging walks forthe very fit. Please wear stout footwear,bring a drink and a mac in case there’s ashower.

Details of all the Festival Walks areavailable on the website atwww.southdownssociety.org.uk, or bypost from the South Downs Society,telephone 01798 875073.

Open to any age and ability, this friendlygroup based at Lancing Manor ‘Impulse’Leisure Centre, offer a free “Come & Try”scheme. This gives you the opportunity totry your hand at this sport, without havingto invest in any boules equipment.

You are very welcome to just turn up atone of their club nights on a Tuesday orThursday evening from 7pm onward orSunday morning from 10.30am.

If you choose to take up the sport a set of 3 match boules costs £35 - £40 andmembership of the club is veryreasonable.

Group Bookings

Groups of friends and local clubs arewelcome to book an afternoon orevening session. All equipment isprovided with informal supervisionand instruction, offering you, yourfriends and colleges an entertainingafternoon or evening session underfloodlights.

The session could be combined with ameal and drink at the Leisure Centre.

A temporary membership fee ischarged.

For more information please contact:Albert and Diana Hollis 01903 776387or visit www.adurpetanque.co.uk

your magazine 5

Are you a new group or society?editor@thelancingvillager.co.uk

Last chance!

Off the beaten track and down sometwisting country lanes (we got lost twice!)stands this wonderful windmill. Shipleywindmill is the youngest and the largestwindmill in Sussex. She is an eight-sidedsmock mill, so-called because she issupposed to look like the old-fashionedfarm labourer's smock.

She - for windmills are always female -has been known at different times asShipley Mill, King's Mill, Vincent's Mill andBelloc's Mill. She was built in 1879 for Mr. Fred Marten by Mr. Grist, millwright ofHorsham, a firm that had its premises onthe corner of London Road and SpringfieldRoad.

The mill is famous for its links with writerHilaire Belloc. In 1906 Kings Land, themill and five acres of surrounding landwere bought by the writer, who thenleased the mill. Hilaire lived there until hisdeath in 1953, about 40 years after hiswife.

More recently the mill has been featuredin the TV programme Jonathan Creek.

Sadly, Shipley Windmill Charitable Trustand the Friends of Shipley Windmillannounced earlier this year, that thebuilding's landlord would not be renewingthe lease and therefore closure wasunavoidable. So don’t miss your chance tovisit this famous windmill and explore thelocal country lanes!

Remaining open days:Sundays June 7th, 14th & 21stSundays July 5th, 12th & 19th

For more on the fasinating history of thisbuilding visitwww.shipleywindmill.org.uk

Our Interest Groups:

Art AppreciationBook GroupBridgeCard MakingCreative WritingComputersCurrent AffairsFamily HistoryGardeningHistoryLanguagesLocal HistoryPoetryPhotographyScrabbleWalking

Why not come along to our MonthlyMeeting or an Interest Group anddiscover what you have been missing!

For more informationwww.lancingandsomptingu3a.org

Andy Brook on 070787 5627153

U3A has arrived... but is it for you?

If you are retired or semi-retired andwish to join others in social, leisure and

learning activities.. it is for you.

Lancing & Sompting U3A held it’s firstmonthly General Meeting in April 2009and currently has 109 members. We arepart of a world-wide organisation whichbegan in France in 1972. Created forolder people who wish to explore newinterests and activities and learn abouttheir chosen subject in an informal group.

There are a growing number of groups inthe UK with more than 20, here inSussex.

We have established several InterestGroups, led by an enthusiastic volunteerCo-ordinator. These groups are entirelyindependent.

U3A members are welcome to join asmany groups as they wish and ‘dip in andout’ of Interest Groups.

Our General Meetings give us theopportunity to hear how the group as awhole is evolving and for individuals totalk to members of other Interest Groups.Previous meetings have included aninteresting talk by an invited ‘speaker’.

I have met many lively, interesting peopleand learnt a lot.

- Sonja Braeman, Local History Co-ordinator

66 The Lancing Villager June 2009

TITHING TIMESwww.tithingtimes.wordpress.com

MEMORIES OF SOUTH LANCING

Last month I asked for information aboutAlma Street, Lancing. This is a response Ireceived from Martin Hofton, who nowlives in Quebec.

‘At the end of Alma Street opposite thelaundry stands a detached house calledBijou Cottage where we lived from 1951to 1955. We didn't own it. At that time itbelonged to a Mr. Duncan-Brown and myfather rented it from him. I think hebought it just before we became tenants.Bijou Cottage was built in the mid 1800's(1870's or 80's maybe). It was originallya fisherman's cottage. In the 1980's Imet the lady who was living there then (I don't have her name, she was aphysics teacher) and she showed mecopies of all the original deeds from thetime of its construction.

I remember my mother telling me thatthe foundations were actually below sealevel and when the tides were very high,the cellar would flood and the dampwould rise up in the walls and thewallpaper would come unstuck.

The laundry was there then, it was calledThe Southern Laundry. It didn't extend allthe way to the end of the street, becauseright opposite Bijou Cottage was thewooden workshop of a Mr. Brown whowas a carpenter. He had a son called Paulwho was a few years older than me.

Alma Street ended at Bijou Cottage witha wall and a gate which gave access tothe nursery. I think the nurseryman wascalled Mr. Bailey and he was related tothe owners, the Marshals.

Alma Street was surfaced with crushedcinders, which probably came from thelaundry boiler, it had no drainage andwhen it rained hard a huge puddleformed just outside our garden gatewhich we had to paddle through.Eventually the black coal-dust-filled waterwould overflow into our garden (whichwas a bit below street level) and pourthrough the grating into the cellar. Myfather complained to the laundry, theParish Council and everyone else he couldthink of, but nothing ever got done.

Between the cottage and the wall of thePark was a single story extension whichwas the kitchen, bathroom and scullery.The bath was covered with a woodenboard and filled from an Ascot heater. The bath and the kitchen were at thePark end and when you stood at the sinkyou looked across the little yard at adouble green shed, backing on to thenursery, which was the toilet and the coalshed. (They're hidden behind the bigbush in the right of the photo). My twoyounger brothers slept in a bunk bed inthe little bedroom on the right at the topof the stairs and my parents on the left,from where you could just see the seathrough a gap in the houses. As theprivileged elder brother, I slept on a divan

in the lounge downstairs which had adoor opening into the greenhouse,somewhat pretentiously called the"conservatory". Mum grew plants there, Imade model aeroplanes and we storedour bikes in there too.

I think the house next door was calledAlma House.

About halfway down the street, on thesame side, lived a Mr. Streeter. I believehis daughter lives there now - I met her afew years ago. Also, apparently on thelaundry side, in one of the first houses inthe street is a Mr. Terry Stewart who wasa boy of about my age at the time, andstill lives there.’

Alma Street and Bijou Cottage

Bijou Cottage, taken in the early 1950s by Martin with a box brownie camera Bijou Cottage as it is today

Unearthing our past

I recently took a trip out to Bignor Roman Villa nearChichester. It is often overshadowed by Fishbourne RomanPalace, but it has a charm all of it’s own. Here, you can walkon part of the mosiac floors and get a feel of the site, isolatedand still surrounded by fields. Many of the floors are coveredwith the original thatched buildings erected in the late 1800’swhen the remains were first discovered.

Fragments of roof tile and mosaic are being excavated almost daily - by the molepopulation. The staff of the museum regularly check the new mole hills for finds and aswe watched yet another tessera was unearthed!

your magazine 7

marine

Welcome Sussex marine anglers, June ishere and so are the sharks!! But more onthat later.

May was a real mixed bag in terms offishing in Sussex with the expectedpredictions hopelessly wrong in places.

The Bream arrived earlier than normaland of a good size too, a 4lb specimenwas caught from the shore at Widewateralong with many in the 2lb range, the firstMullet arrived close inshore along withBass up to 11lb, plentiful Garfish andlarge shoals of Mackerel chasing theSmelt up and down Worthing piers lengthon sunny settled days.

Boats have done well, with better thanaverage Plaice catches, as well as Bream,Dogfish and a few small rarities includingsmall Brill and Turbot. Along with thehuge shoals of Pout that seem to be herein great numbers at the moment, eatingeverything put before them.

All the species caught during May shouldcontinue to show for the rest of thesummer with the addition of Gurnard,maybe an early Red Mullet and a fewgood Sole could be found on the nighttides. In addition to this on dirty waterdays, Dogfish will show up from the pierends, along with a few Eels which seem tobe around in better numbers (but still notmany) than last year. This species is

Would you like to write a column ?editor@thelancingvillager.co.uk

under so much pressure at the moment, Ido wonder if they will survive the ravagesof the virus that is affecting them. Thevirus is passed onto them by the southernhemisphere equivalent and it is predictedthat it may take the northern hemisphereEel twenty years to build immunity to theproblem that is, of course, providingenough survive this period.

One species I have not yet mentionedthat is readily caught from the boats inthe summer months is the Common andStarry Smoothhounds. In the past fewyears, thousand upon thousand of thesesmall sharks come right up to the beacheswithin the groynes, on night tides foragingfor their prey. These super strong houndscan reach weights of almost twentypounds, and they steam in toward theshore in huge numbers, usually fromaround the last week or two of June tillthe first week in July. They are generallyfound in the areas west of Worthing toRustington, but they could turn up almostanywhere in Sussex on any night andgone the next. The reason for their arrivalis that they are hunting peeling Spidercrabs who try to take refuge close inshorefrom the predators whilst they arevulnerably soft shelled. You can often findthem hiding in the sand next to thegroynes at low water, it is certainly wortha look, especially with the kids who find

Mike HarwoodShoreham Angling Squad

Yours for £30adverts@thelancingvillager.co.uk

with adults alike how ugly and creepythey are. It is thought that these specieshave been forced inshore due to the poorstate of the sea bed off shore, possiblycaused by commercial fishing practises,but of course there is no proof of this.

So, if you are one of those people wholike a midnight dip it might be worthconsidering what exactly is swimming andwalking around beneath you, but fear not,the hounds have their teeth in the back oftheir throats and neither them, or thespider crabs have a habit of pursuinghumans……………. But then again, I didn’tmention the tope, did I?

Be safe out therewww.shorehamanglingsquad.co.uk

Tea break time(Solution to May issue)

88 The Lancing Villager June 2009

The Lancing Villager provides a forum for local people and as such is impartial. All columns in the

Lancing Villager are the opinions of the writers and not the publication itself unless otherwise

stated. Whilst every care has been taken to ensure that data in this publication is accurate, neither the

publisher nor it’s editorial contributors can accept, and hereby disclaim, any liability to any party for

loss or damage caused by errors or omissions resulting from negligence, accident or any other cause.

The Lancing Villager does not officially endorse any advertising material included within this

publication.

ACROSS1. Suffocate (7)4. Transgression (7)8. Amber-coloured sweetmeat (6,5)12. First man (4)13. Created (4)14. Drive back (5)15. Native of India (6)17. Stalks (5)22. Sour (4)23. Halts (5)24. Petty criminal (4)25. Absorbent cloth (5)28. Barren place (6)30. Dish of raw vegetables (5)32. Ride a surfboard (4)34. Spouse (4)35. Planetary model (11)38. Illicit drug (7)39. British rock group (7)

Tea break time(Solution to follow in our next issue)

The Lancing Villager is an independent small business. All rights reserved. No part of this

publication may be reproduced, stored in any retrieved systems or transmitted in any form -

electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise - without the prior permission of the

Publisher.

The use of this publication for canvassing, direct marketing or any other activity, apart from the

sourcing of local goods and services, is strictly prohibited.

© 2009 The Lancing Villager 01/06/09

DOWN 1. Crouch (5)2. Streetcar (4)3. Snake-like fish (3)5. Influenza (3)6. Examination (4)7. Entailing great expense (9)8. Building for storing hay (4)9. Level (4)10. Storage shelter (4)11. Speed contest (4)14. Elevate (5)16. Evade (5)18. Flavour (5)19. Bizarre (9)20. Exclamation of surprise (3)21. Inquired (5)26. Twist (4)27. Concern (4)28. Individual facts (4)29. Wander (4)31. Sturdy twilled trousers (5)33. Bloodsucking insect (4)34. Mongrel dog (4)36. Convent dweller (3)37. Fish eggs (3)

All photographs are the copyright of Ray Hamblett unless otherwise stated

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