The Meadow -Flash news!

At the end of April and beginning of May a cuckoo has been heard calling in Down Grange Meadow several times, for the first time (certainly since 2006). Regrettably  our ornithology expert  did not hear a reply….  so  it may not stop but  search on.

The Orchard

What a wonderful blossom Spring this is proving to be! Lets hope that this translates into a  good fruit year.

As we  finished the Spring working season we  just about finished the mini-dead hedges we  have been creating over last few months. What i the idea?

Early on in our plans for the Orchard we had a  natural break point between the kick-about grass area and the beginning of the Community Orchard proper by the oak trees. This was never  very  clearly  indicated but  a few years ago  we asked some of the local youngsters to plant some  shrubs along that line – 5 years later some of them have done very well – others have been slower  to  grow. What was needed was  a  support frame to enable them to be  encouraged to form a hedegrow –  so we created the  narrow dead hedging you can see, tied the scramblers to it and  ‘layed’ the hazels along it. In time this will then become a ‘live hedgerow’  instead of the ‘dead’ one.

Further into the Orchard area there is another small arc of dead hedging which has been treated in the same way and again , in time , will form a live hedge. neither of these features is intended to grow more than  four feet high but should present the  birds and insects with  flowers and berries during the year.