Nearly there! Over 90 trees planted so far.

Another productive morning planting 30cm whips along the line of the Spiral Maze, filling in the gaps left last year.  These trees are part of the Centenary Woods in memory of the First World War.

 

Seven volunteers with me behind the camera!

 

To help the seven volunteers, I drew out a map of the design, so that we could see more clearly where we needed to plant.

 

Andrew also had the idea of tying tape to each cane, so that Roger will be able to see the line of trees, when he tops the grassy paths.  This has made it a lot clearer for us all to see where the hedgerow is.

 

Each cane now has a red and white flag

 As well as the 30cm whips, supplied by The Woodland Trust, we also planted Goat Willow and Red Dogwood cuttings.  If these survive they will help to fill out the rows, while the smaller ones are catching up.  

 

We found several caterpillars low down in the grass, showing just how mild a winter we are having, with hardly a frost yet.  One was the caterpillar of the Ringlet butterfly which breeds on this site.

More trees planted today

First Tree Planting - another planned for next Sunday (13th December)

Well. the weather forecast was for mild, dry weather - but it started drizzly and then got heavier!

Nevertheless, three hardy volunteers stuck with it and we have planted 16 new trees in the wildlife area - hawthorn, silver birch, oak, rowan and blackthorn.

Graham from Winkleigh Parish Council watches Phil and Penny at work

 

 

 

 

 

 

 
As these trees were given by The Woodland Trust to plant as a Centenary Wood in memory of those who served and died in the First World War, we were glad that 'Major Ron' of the Winkleigh branch of the British Legion, was also able to visit us.  He was very encouraging and fully supports what we are doing for our community, for future generations and in remembrance of our grandfather's generation.

http://www.woodlandtrust.org.uk/support-us/support-an-appeal/centenary-woods/


I also took the opportunity to do some maintenance of a dozen or more trees which were planted in previous years.  Here is one of the first Oak trees which were planted on top of The Mound exactly three years ago in December 2012.  This one is about 4 feet high (1.2 metres).  They were planted to celebrate the Queens Jubilee.

Jubilee Oak 2012