Hedges and award
Anyone seeing the hedges around the Curry Woods Conservation area field just after they had been laid last winter would be forgiven for thinking “that’s the end of those hedges” However the skills of generations past may look ridiculous to us today but they work! The hedge plants, although the stems were nearly severed and laid flat, responded vigorously and grew strongly. Drought, (what drought?!), they still grew without any attention through the warmest summer since 1976. This is an example, if any is needed, of why the sustainable ways of antiquity were so successful. Growing plants for food, fuel and building worked for 1000 years before plastics, probably we could do it again. We (Paul actually) have now manually cut the new hedges using hand held tools and very good it looks too. There is a picture of Paul Deacon working on the hedge. There are some areas that need extra planting where there wasn’t anything to lay but of the new hazel shrub planted in some of these gaps only one did not survive the heat in the summer.A super new information board has been designed and Paul managed the printing. Our Treasurer/ Engineer Alan Cockerell built some supports out of angle iron he had left from another job and erected the board by the gate. A picture speaks a thousand words! Please come and see our beautiful new hedge and information board.We have also planted three test strips with wild flower mixtures to see which works best to grow wild perennial plants. We will then be able to use the best method to plant up that part of the field that is not woodland. Some mainly grass area will be left to provide cover for our resident hares.Finally, as mentioned in the CRiB article, we entered the Britain in Bloom stand alone “In your Neighbourhood” class. We were judged to be outstanding, achieving the highest score and winning the “Monk Trophy” for the best planting of native plants in the South West. To have the national Royal Horticultural Society endorsing our project so fulsomely is truly humbling and I wish to record my personal thanks to the Trustees (As the judge wrote in his remarks “I met Peter, Paul and Mary (Sylvia’s middle name”) as well as Alan and Catherine. Also thanks to the enormous help given to us by the wonderful Re-imagining the Levels team who have sponsored the planting of 60000 trees and shrubs across Somerset. I won’t name them all but they know who they are!. Finally, finally thanks to all of you who subscribed, dug, planted and read the articles. Do walk the area and see the developing woods, look especially for those areas in the mature woodland that have been fenced off to keep out our deer friends, See how they differ from the unfenced areas in the spring, any pictures and stories of things you have seen can be sent to us for inclusion on the website or for inclusion in CRN articles with your permission. Our website is currywoodsconservationtrust.comxample Text
