Report of the Essex Field Club for 2003-2004
status and Mary Smith undertook the arduous task of amending the rules. The Council expressed
their appreciation to Mary for all the time and effort she had expended on our behalf.
On-line database
Teknica Ttd was commissioned by the Club to produce a database-enabled website facility for delivery
of natural history record data via a public web interface., an extension of experimental work carried out
under a previous contract. The total costs of £3,000 will be met from the sale of antiquarian books.
Essex biological record centre
The Club was strongly represented at meetings at Writtle College and County Hall in the course of
the year. Peter Harvey gave a presentation of the Club's general position at the Writtle College
meeting on 26th November 2003.
Other recent publications
February 2004 saw the publication of Mark Hanson's Essex Parks, a book detailing the history and
wildlife of Essex parks with chapters on buildings, great oaks, grazing animals, and notable bird
species. The second section details the Club's survey of Hylands Park. The multi-disciplinary approach
by Recorders and other Club members meant that for the first time in Essex a comprehensive account
of the flora and fauna of an Essex park has been published. The attractive design and layout by Peter
Harvey should lead to sales both to specialists and others with more general interests.
The long awaited publication of The Moth of Essex also took place in February, for which the Club
made a grant of £500 towards the publication costs. The Council also agreed to support publication
of anew Herpetofauna Atlas of the County
Collections and library
Council have been reminded that 2004 is the tenth anniversary of the closure of the Passmore Edwards
Museum and the fourth anniversary of the Collections and Library moving into storage. The Council
continues to seek a safe haven for the Collections and this year there have been contacts with the
National Trust, RHS Hyde Hall, East of England Museums, Libraries and Archives Council, and the
Copped Hall Trust. The Copped Hall Trustees showed much interest and some shock when shown
the scale of the Collections. In truth we are no nearer to finding a permanent home but the search will
continue. Martin Heywood has continued his work looking after the Collections, monitoring the
temperature and humidity as well as holding the mice at bay. More items were collected from the
Queen Elizabeth's Hunting Lodge Museum with more promised. Some school loans items were
donated to the Southend Museum for the use of local schools.
The condition of the storage of our Library is not ideal, and some of our more valuable books have
been stored in a member's home. We are not in a position to be able to insure our most valuable
books, so, for these reasons and also to enable us to finance new publications, the Council reluctantly
agreed to sell some volumes by public auction. Eighteen lots were selected, none of which had any
direct association with Essex. Bonham's of Knightsbridge were our preferred auctioneers and 17
lots eventually went for auction on the 18th November 2003 with a single item following in December.
The total hammer price was £29,140.00 and, after the deduction of commissions, the Club received
£25,154.35p. ANatural History of Birds, four slim leather bound volumes by George Edwards, was
sold for £15,000 which was about three times the expected price. So it was a very successful sale;
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Essex Naturalist (New Series) 21 (2004)