A RETIRED computer programmer from Bussage has raised a whopping £2780 for marine conservation - thanks to a unique crowdfunded book project.

Peter Wormington used crowdfunding to finance the publication of a short illustrated book in aid of the Marine Conservation Society (MCS).

A keen boats-man in the 1970s, Peter sailed around the world on a square rigged sailing ship called the Eye of the Wind.

It was there that he he first came across a poem called Flying Fish, by John Henry Gray.

“I found it in an anthology while sailing in seas full of flying fish,” he said.

“I recently read a report by the World Wildlife Fund, which said that since my sailing days, the number of fish in the sea has halved; and the number of big fish has fallen by three quarters.

“So if I repeated my sailing trip now I would see many fewer fish.”

Peter wanted to do something to help, and so decided to set the Flying Fish poem in a book of its own, with attractive illustrations, as a way of raising funds.

He chose to fund the project through crowdfunding, a system through which people with a good idea can ask the general public for funding to set up or expand.

“I love the style of illustration in the Tintin books and I wondered if it would be possible to illustrate poetry using the Tintin clear lines style,” he said.

“I had a go myself – disastrous.”

But via the internet, Peter managed to find an artist to create the kind of imagery he wanted, in Argentina.

Copies of the book are now available at £10 each, of which £5 goes to the Marine Conservation Society.

For further information contact him at: petergwormington@gmail.com