HEAVERS HEAVERS

Feet are tapping and hands are clapping as Treacle Eater Clog Northwest Morris dancers and musicians are celebrating their 40th year with performances across many of our much-loved venues. Welcoming the dance season proper, the Treacle Eaters, joined by Wyvern Jubilee Morris and Enigma Border Dancers, performed on Ham Hill before dancing at a Jack in the Green event in Evercreech.

On Monday, June 26 the group will perform at Cerne Abbas at 7.45pm and The Greyhound in Sydling St Nicholas at 8.45pm. Then on July 10 they’ll be outside Halstock Village Shop at 7.45pm and the Fox Inn at Corscombe at 8.45pm. Performances are free however it is Morris tradition to pass around a hat. At the end of the evening, the Treacle Eaters retreat inside for refreshment and a music session.

Researchers are calling for help from people in South and West Dorset to monitor what is believed to be Britain’s smallest population of coastal bottlenose dolphins. Sailors, fishers and anyone else who spends a lot of time at sea are being urged to feed information about dolphin sightings to the South Coast Bottlenose Consortium, a partnership of conservation groups, universities, businesses and governing bodies. The consortium was formed last year to monitor a pod of around 40 dolphins that has been spotted all along Britain’s southern coastline, from the north shores of Devon and Cornwall to the beaches of East Sussex. The consortium said they are calling for the public’s help to try and build a ‘comprehensive pattern’ of where the dolphins travel at different times of the year and whether particular factors, like human activity or environmental conditions, influence their movements.

A consortium spokesperson said the length of the dolphins’ coastal range and the small size of the pod makes it ‘incredibly difficult’ for marine conservation experts to track them in detail.