Thursday 26/12/24 There was no work party on Boxing Day but Jan has been doing more research into the mill workers, so I added their stories to the website with pictures and maps showing some of the places where they lived. There are now five mill workers including William Scott who tragically died at the mill.
Thursday 2/1/25 Our first work party of 2025 marks 10 years since the HLF grant was awarded to restore the mill, see the EDP article dated 26/1/15. The first volunteer work party was not until 26/3/15 when we started exploring and clearing the site, I remember it well. See the Activity section to see what we have achieved over the years.
Today we saw a Little Egret fly up from the river on our way to the mill, Howard also spotted a Kingfisher flying along the river near the mill.
The fences beside both damaged walls and around the cistern area had all blown down in recent storms, so Howard untangled the fencing tape, repaired the fence posts by fitting extra pieces of wood to the bases and putting more bricks around them to hold them in place.
There were two Cygnets in the river near the mill and a Swan and Cygnet just upstream from our bridge. Several Sheep were loose again on the footpath which walked past, we also saw a large flock of Geese fly over the surrounding fields.
Eddie cut some oversize logs to fit our fire and took logs from the wood store into the wagon. I split some large pieces of wood I brought back from down the track before Christmas where a large tree was felled, Eddie stacked them in the log store.
Eddie lit the fire as soon as we arrived and later he put Greggs sausage rolls in the oven for our lunch, as Papworths butchers was closed today, they were much better than we expected. Eddie got 4 for the price of 3 so we shared the fourth one.
Emma arrived after lunch, we said she should have come down earlier and had a sausage roll, Emma reminded us she doesn’t eat meat. We thanked Emma for putting the owl box back in the tree before Christmas. Emma said she pulled the Owl box up on a rope from the ground and David climbed into the tree and fitted it. Emma suggested displaying the bone mill employee research in the gazebo at open days, we all agreed.
Beryl gave us a box of suet balls today and after lunch Eddie filled up all the bird food. The long seed feeder had fallen down again so we put it back in a different place in the tree. I got a barrow of soil from the mole hills and we tipped it around the base of the feeding station as the soil has a lot of mouse holes and the pole keeps falling over, so we trod the soil in to make it firm.
Howard drilled holes in the bases of some of the insect hotels so the ground stakes fit them, and hammered them in. Eddie and I removed the broken Butterfly box on a stand and replaced it with a spare, then staked it down again. It was still frosty at 3:30 pm so we put all the tools away and came back. We saw a Heron flying near the Maltings.
Review of 2024
In January the river partly flooded the track but we made it to the mill and the water was the highest we’ve seen, covering the brick floor in front of the water wheel and coming right up inside the wheel. We had to repair our nest camera system as mice chewed through the cable, we got it working in time to see Jackdaws and Great Tits raising their chicks again. We clean out the nestboxes every year ready for the next season.
Anne Marie has planted a lot of flowering plants in the gardens we made at the mill as well as weeding and watering them regularly. This year Tulips and Iron Cross flowered. Snowdrops appeared in February on our riverbank and in April we all walked down to the Tulip fields near the farm bridge to see the flowers.
In May the bone mill volunteers were given Unsung Hero Awards which recognise people who work in the community. Peter Wilkinson nominated us for the awards and presented the certificates to us at the mill.
We celebrated the 80th anniversary of D Day at our spring open days. Volunteers made a model of a D Day beach from re-used materials, a Breckland Council grant paid for a gazebo for displays including a slideshow, posters and 40s memorabilia in display cases made by the volunteers. We had radio control model tanks for visitors to use and 40s music playing.
Our meadow flowered again this year, Foxgloves appeared for the first time. We planted three small Oak trees in the meadow and we cut footpaths through it all summer. We also made another insect hotel from a chutney box we were given by Anne Marie. We didn’t have to pull up as many large weeds from the meadow this year as we pulled them out last year before they went to seed.
We’ve had a number of visitors who crossed our bridge at our Thursday work parties to look around the mill and visitor centre. We always enjoy showing visitors our work and the finds we have discovered.
In August we converted our greenhouse into a timber store as it was not being used, and we had a lot of wood stored in our shed. We also repaired and repainted the bench seat opposite the mill on the footpath which is popular with walkers.
This year the September Heritage Open Days theme was Routes, Networks, Connections so we had displays showing how the mill related to various industries, the owners other businesses, and the different transport methods used. The volunteers made the displays which were housed in our gazebo. We had our water wheel turning at both open weekends and we got very positive feedback from the visitors survey.
The bone mill featured in a comprehensive article in the November issue of KL Magazine, our volunteer awards were also mentioned in a Lynn News article.
We had to make several repairs to our swinging footbridge this year so we decided to fully refurbish it to make sure its safe, we replaced all the floor panels and wooden supports in October.
The wildflower meadow was partly re-seeded in October, we plan to re-seed the rest in spring to get more diverse flowering.
We haven’t managed to get our fallen riverside wall repaired this year due to Fred’s workload, we need good weather for this as the track is too slippery to get machines to the mill in winter. We have another Grey Wagtail box and Kingfisher nest tunnel to fit to the wall when its repaired.
In November we held a Saturday work party which was attended by Ryan, Tabitha and Pete who can’t join us on Thursdays as they are working, we made a solitary Bee nest box with Perspex viewing panels so we can watch the progress of the larvae.
A storm blew our Barn Owl box off the tree so Emma and David refitted it in December. Trees came down in the recent storms which we cleared from the public footpath and the track to the mill. We took some of the logs back for firewood.
Research is being carried out by Jan into bone mill employees from the 1800s, the first five, including a man who died in an accident at the mill, now have their details on the website with more people to follow.
Recent finds have been collated on a new website page with links to view the various items discovered at work parties, river walks and when working on our projects.
Graham Bartlett
Interactive Plan Activity Green Grant Wildflower Gallery Volunteer Previous Last Year Latest Finds Mill Workers
