Planting for the future - tree and hedge planting events

Local environment groups are organising tree and hedge planting events over the next few weeks. New volunteers are always welcome - you can bring your children or grandchildren too. Major tools are provided.

Wapley Bushes Conservation Group has work mornings on Sunday 18 February (this coming Sunday) and Saturday 17 March. Volunteers will be planting a mixture of native trees in the main woodland as part of a three-year planting project. They will also be pruning the local variety fruit trees and doing a litter pick - there are different types of work to suit everyone.

Meet at the Shire Way entrance to the woodland, south Yate, BS37 8US, 10.00am. Please wear stout footwear, and bring gloves and a pair of secateurs if you have them. The Wapley Bushes Local Nature Reserve blog has lots of information about Wapley and other local wildlife events.


Lilliput Conservation Group will be planting short lengths of hedge and drifts of bulbs in Lilliput Park on Saturday 24 February and Tuesday 6 March, plus tidying up the hedgerows and planting and litter picking. Again there is something for everyone, and you can work at your own pace.


Meet at the Kingfisher Road gate at 10.00 am. Please wear stout footwear, and gloves if you have them. You can check out the Lilliput Conservation Group on Facebook for more information.

Volunteers start major tree planting programme at Wapley Bushes

Wapley Bushes Conservation Group is carrying out a major programme of tree planting this autumn and winter, to deal with the threat of Ash Dieback Disease. This disease is carried by a fungus. Mature trees are the most affected - they lose their leaves and the crown dies back. It's within a dozen miles of Wapley Bushes Local Nature Reserve. If something isn't done now, within twenty years we will have lost all the high canopy in Wapley Woods.

The Conservation Group has come up with a scheme to plant other large native species throughout the woodland. This season they will be planting 90 to 100 trees - Oak, Lime, Black Poplar, Whitebeam and Wild Service trees. They are all native to the West of England area.

Hopefully members of the local community will come along and help preserve this wonderful woodland. Families with children are particularly welcome - it's really planting for the future. The Conservation Group supply the trees, the tools and gloves, people just need to wear wellies or stout footwear.

The first planting morning will be at 10.00 am on Saturday 18 November at the Shire Way entrance to the Nature Reserve, opposite the road entrance to Cherington, BS37 8US. There will also be planting sessions on Sunday 18 February and Saturday 18 March. The trees and preparation work are being financed by the landowners, Dodington Parish Council.

Help with tree planting and litter picking at Wapley Bushes

There will be a tree planting, litter picking and conservation morning at Wapley Bushes on Saturday 25th March 2017 from 10am until 12 noon.


We will be planting some young trees in the woodland and doing a "spring clean" of the Nature Reserve and Common.

Meet at the Shire Way entrance to the Nature Reserve. All children must be accompanied by an adult. Litter pickers, black sacks, disposable gloves will be provided. Please wear walking boots or wellies.

Help Spring Clean Yate!

Dates for your diaries... If You want to help make a difference, the Spring Clean of Brinsham Park is 7th March 10am, and on 12 April there’s wildflower planting.

Interested? Contact John Ford for details.

If you know of other local Spring Clean or planting events, please email paul.hulbert@gmail.com so that we can advertise them here.

Fruit trees for the future

Gloria and Malcolm Stephen with Mr Fruit

Councillors and friends recently planted some fruit trees in the Quiet Corner at Lilliput Park, to inprove the diversity of plants in the park. In future years they will provide welcome shade in the summer and fruit for local people later in the year.

If you would like to find out more about fruit trees, there will be a free Winter Fruit Tree Pruning Workshop at Wapley Bushes on Sunday 15 February.

The workshop tutor will be local fruit tree expert "Mr Fruit" (Graham White), who supervised the Lilliput Park planting. Advance booking is not needed - just turn up on the day. Meet at the southern Besom Lane entrance to Wapley Bushes Local Nature Reserve, Besom Lane, Westerleigh, BS37 8RW, starting at 10am.

Linda Boon - she had  the best soil to dig in!

Paul Hulbert and Pat Cotterell had to use
a crowbar to get rid of the rocks in this spot.

Plant a Jubilee Hedge for Mothers Day!

This splendid woodland in Wapley Bushes Local Nature Reserve was planted by volunteers in a single morning on Mothers Day in 1994. Eighty people took part, half of them children. The trees are now over twenty feet tall, and now they need a hedge to mark the border between the woodland and the Upper Meadow.

Please come and help this Sunday morning, March 18th. It would be lovely to see some of the parents and particularly the children, now grown up, who took part in the original planting so long ago. Who knows, maybe they could bring along some of the next generation too?

Everyone is welcome - meet at 10.00 am at the Shire Way entrance to the Nature Reserve, near the zebra crossing opposite Cherington, South Yate. Please wear wellies or similar, and bring a spade if you can.

The trees for the hedge planting morning are being provided by the Woodland Trust as part of their Queen Elizabeth's Diamond Jubilee Year Project to plant 6 million trees nationwide. A second length of the Jubilee Hedge has been funded by South Gloucestershire Council's Biodiversity and Landscape Grant scheme and by Dodington Parish Council's annual grant to Wapley Bushes Conservation Group.

The Wapley Bushes Conservation Group is very grateful to all its partners and supporters. Without the necessary funding and advice they wouldn't be able to improve this lovely area for future generations.