Dartmoor Magazines

There is nothing better than to look forward to a magazine which is all about your favourite hobby, subject, or interest and Dartmoor is no exception. At present there are two such Dartmoor specific publications available; The Dartmoor News and The Dartmoor Magazine. Until recently there was a third, Dartmoor - The Country Magazine this first hit the shelves in 1998 and was published by Halsgrove. The autumn of 2006 saw the last issue of this magazine as it was absorbed into a general Devonshire magazine. Which was a shame as it was a nicely illustrated magazine with many various Dartmoor topics although these were very general. This then leaves us with the two original publications, a comparison of which is shown below:

Having collected virtually every issue of both magazines it is interesting to see their evolution from the early black and white days right up to the full colour of today. Both magazines carry their own strap lines, The Dartmoor Magazine claims on its website to be, "Dartmoor's largest selling colour magazine", which size-wise has to be true. The Dartmoor News simply says, "The Dartmoor News gives you moor", which again it certainly does. Both editors are  published Dartmoor authors in their own right with several excellent books under their belts.

Over the years both magazines have published interesting articles about every aspect of Dartmoor all of which were written by learned Dartmoor enthusiasts. The Dartmoor Magazine does also run an accompanying website but there is very little Dartmoor information on it apart from what the magazine is currently featuring, it would be nice to see a few 'previously printed' articles from the magazine. The Dartmoor News however launched an excellent new website on the 1st of January 2008 to commemorate its 100th issue. The website contains a news section along with an events diary, dining recommendations and a forthcoming nature section - well worth a visit.

A few weeks ago some Dartmoor enthusiasts got into a discussion which went along the theoretical lines of if we were stuck on a desert island which of the two magazines would you want to recieve. The answers were interesting to say the least and showed the vast difference of what individuals look for in a magazine, albeit specifically themed on Dartmoor. Like the old saying, "you can't never please all of the people all of the time", and to be an editor of such magazines must be a nightmare. But the general consensus of opinion was that the Dartmoor News would be dropping onto the desert island. Why? because it was felt that The Dartmoor Magazine carries too many adverts (as seen from the above figures), regardless of size if you took an actual word count the Dartmoor News would win hands down. It was also felt that too many repetitive regular features such as an equipment review appeared in The Dartmoor Magazine. There are not that many advances in outdoor equipment that you can devote a page every three months to it. But if you are a true Dartmoor enthusiast then you will collect every book and magazine published about the place regardless so both magazines have their place on my bookshelves.

Whilst on the topic of Dartmoor magazines I was astounded to read one called Margins which centres on short stories and poems inspired by Dartmoor. At first the magazine seemed well presented and interesting but then I came across an article written by the editor called, "Dartmoor Custard". This title sounded familiar and after reading the article so did the contents, much of it appeared to come from my web page on gorse. I emailed the editor from a second address and asked where she got her material from as I was writing a dissertation on the 'Vegetation and Folklore of Dartmoor'. I eventually got the following reply;

"I have to say that most of the information in that article came from the internet. Perhaps you would like to send me in a short article on something interesting about the autumn vegetation on Dartmoor the heather or small gorse or bracken to be considered for a possible future issue?? 250 to 500 words is enough for an article. A story is 1500 to 2000".

A reply went back saying there was no need to send in a short article as she (the editor) could just simply help herself from my website like before.