A Guest Blog from Joanne Beattie, Marketing and Community Assistant
On a very frosty morning in mid- November, we held a Volunteering Member Event at Parklands Woods, Ufford.
The Friends of Parkland Woods had been awarded 420 saplings from the Woodland Trust. Our mission was simple – to plant them all! On arrival whilst enjoying a cuppa to warm us up, we had a presentation from the Forestry Commission all about these wonderful woods. These woods have not been proactively managed for about 20 years so it was lovely to hear about what they hope to achieve and how our volunteering event will help.
They had already cleared and made a dead hedge along part of the boundary between the Avenue and the woods; our newly-planted saplings were to be the new hedgerow protecting the boundaries of the woods The dead hedge will give protection to the saplings and will gradually disintegrate over the next few years. After we had planted all the saplings, we then had a demonstration from their forester on how they cut down the trees to create the dead hedges required.
We had a great morning, joined by some of our fabulous volunteers. Some of our members have now signed up to The Friends of Parkland Woods to join their future work parties – it's great to see how our volunteer sessions generate more ongoing involvement in the local community.
