Here we are in June and it’s nearly July – how does the time pass so quickly?

In my last blog I mentioned the Eco-Fest of 14^th April, which turned out to be amazing.  We met so many like-minded people who were interested in our plans and gave us so much moral support.  We made lots of contacts and gleaned ideas that we are fully prepared to steal adopt.  We have the promise of work from a tree-surgeon, who will start some coppicing for us in the autumn, as well as a supremely gifted individual who is helping us with social media (I might go so far as to describe her as ‘stellar’), and many people who are prepared to pave the way for us when we need to approach local schools for opportunities to speak to groups of students.

Through her work, we now have an email address, a Twitter page, a public Facebook page, and an Instagram account.  Since I am ensconced in the Dark Ages, I have not yet availed myself of all of these, but have logged on (to all but Instagram) and know they exist.  Instagram is next to be conquered, I just have to download the app (sigh! Again).

At the Eco-Fest Steve gave his talk about HBUF, in which he coined a new acronym, ‘Trimby’ – ‘Trees in my back yard’.  This experience will stand him and us in good stead when we launch our campaign later on in the year, and need to give illustrated talks to several groups of people.

Through Community First, a charitable trust based in Devizes, we have acquired the services of someone who has been establishing our new logo, a simplified map, literature for our leaflet, and so much more.  Everything takes a lot longer than we imagined, but I expect that is a common theme.  I shall be posting an example of our new leaflet either with this blog, or in our next one.  It is very colourful, simple in its design and exactly what we wanted.

We are also in the throes of ordering our first banner; this will be what is called a ‘feather banner’ and it will be illustrated by some of the designs that have been produced for us (well, naturally, stating the obvious there).

Our wildflower meadow is coming along beautifully.  We were complimented on its progress by Richard Aisbitt, the Joint Botanical Recorder for Wiltshire, who remarked particularly on the presence of grass vetchling lathyrus nissolia .  Well!  Who knew?  It’s actually very pretty, though very small, and does indeed resemble sweetpea.  There are lots of vetch, golden rattle, dog roses, clover, geranium and flowers I don’t know the name of, like the white daisies that have been springing up.  There should be lots of birds foot trefoil a little later on in the season as well.  I went out to take some photographs of the whole area a week or so ago, and should be able to display these here somewhere.  There was one plant in particular that was absolutely covered in bumble bees; I took several photographs of it, hoping to get some bumblebees as well, but they kept on moving.  And can’t be seen in the photograph.  Hmmm.

It’s an exciting time, and will be even more exciting when we’ve got our compact tractor.

The list of trees and shrubs we shall be planting will include:

Tree Species

Alder (Alnus glutinosa)

Aspen (Populus tremula)

Beech (Fagus sylvatica)

Bird Cherry (Prunus padus)

Crab Apple (Malus sylvestris)

Downy Birch (Betula pubescens)

Field Maple (Acer campestre)

Hornbeam (Carpinus betulus)

Lime (Small Leaf) (Tilia cordata)

Oak (Common) (Quercus robur)

Rowan (Sorbus aucuparia)

Silver Birch (Betula pendula)

Sweet Chestnut (Castanea sativa)

Walnut (Juglans rtegia)

Whitebeam (Sorbus aria)

Wild Cherry (Prunus avium)

Shrub Species

Alder Buckthorn (Frangula Aanus)

Dog Rose (Rosa canina)

Dogwood (Cornus sanguinea)

Elder (Sambucus nigra)

Guelder Rose(Viburnum opulus)

Hawthorn (Crataegus monogyna)

Hazel (Corylus avellana)

Holly (Illex aquifolium)

Spindle (Euonymus europaea)

It’s possibly a bit pointless to comment on how long it has been since my last blog.  So let’s draw a veil over that one …

We have had ups and downs galore since my last blog, with more ups than downs in fact.  We have achieved amazing successes, notably a grant from the National Lottery Community Fund for £9,689, which is in support of our ‘Towards Ten Thousand Trees’ project.  We submitted a press release on Tuesday 12^th March in our local ‘Advertiser’, which you may have seen.  There was also a follow-up on both our HBUF Facebook page as well as the Lottery Facebook page.

Ah, social media – how we all love it.

We’ve also got support from the Woodland Trust via their ‘More Trees’ initiative;  and funding via the Central Swindon North Parish Council as well as a pledged amount from the Charity Ball.

So now to gird our loins towards the consultation and advertising campaign.  These are both underway: we have planted the campaign seeds and hope and trust that mid- to end-April will see the shoots growing (do you see what I did there?  Excellent metaphor, I feel).

I find it hard to accept that there may be some local people who are not completely in favour of planting trees, particularly now when there is so much talk about climate change, the benefits of trees to the environment and to people’s mental health, and that amazing Swedish teenager, Greta Thunberg, who is spearheading an initiative to insist that governments deal much more effectively with climate change.  She has now been nominated for the Nobel peace (nearly wrote Novel peach) prize.  I can only applaud her courage in being able to speak publicly to such august organisations as the United Nations, so feel that any nerves about campaigning for our project are very trivial by comparison.

Look for us at the Swindon Eco Fest 2019, on Sunday 14^th April, 11.00-5.00, Savernake Street Social Hall.  Loins might not be fully girded by then, but we should have some good ideas to share.

Well, the good intentions went by the board, didn’t they?  And here we are again, nearly a month later.

People are weird, aren’t they?  Of course, I include myself in that.  Anyone who, when they’re flush, can’t decide which of two items to buy, so decides to buy both, must be a little odd, don’t you think?

But, let us return to our sheep, as the French would say, and consider some of the behaviours people who walk round our little Elysian Fields known as HBUF can get up to.

First of all, there are those (or just one person, who knows?) who can’t bear to let foxgloves grow there.  Being fairly successful wild flowers, foxgloves will self-seed given the right circumstances so, when we planted them, we kind of expected to see more and more as time went on.  However, no foxglove that has ever reared its head there has been allowed to settle and produce little ones.  No sooner planted than, whoosh, they have disappeared almost overnight.  Is this someone who thinks too much about the poisonous nature of the foxglove (digitalis) and therefore wishes to eradicate it?  In which case, I wonder if they should consider doing the same with rhubarb, tomatoes, cabbage, peanuts and, no doubt, lots more common or garden (sorry about the pun) items that we have in our food cupboards.

There are so many plants that, yes, contain toxins while, at the same time, being a boon to wildlife.  In looking up poisonous plants, I find that elderberries and elderflowers are poisonous to humans when they are not ripe, but they are a delicious meal for some insects and birds.  And how could we eradicate the yew tree?  Such an amazing species, that can live for hundreds of years.  And who would want to get rid of laburnum trees and wisteria, that give such pleasure to the eye?  Neither could we dismiss the humble willow tree, many of which may be found in our woodland.  What about holly, and ivy then?  Look them up.

Apologies for the lecture, but really!  Is anyone going to start eating foxgloves, for goodness’ sake?

Another odd behaviour that has been observed is that of the person or persons who does not approve of tree guards, so systematically removed them on a regular basis. This all started with our first tree plantings.  One day, there all the little whips were, nicely guarded and, the next, the guards would be pulled off and laid beside them on the ground.  Often beautifully neat, each one beside its little tree; but sometimes all piled up in a heap.  So one (or two, or several) of us would put them all on again.  And, shortly afterwards, the same thing would happen once more.  There were suspicions as to who it might be, but no certainties.  But, as I said at the start, people are weird sometimes.  And there must be some belief that the guards do no good or, even worse, cause harm.  They are there to protect the bark from the deer, who nibble the little trees dry, thus killing them.  They are also a protection from rabbits, but we don’t have any of those (we sincerely hope).

The young trees are, by the way, looking wonderful, despite all these odd events.  And those that are growing in the centre of the brambles have really shot up.  Such a pleasure.

So now it’s the festive season again.  HBUF are invited, once more, to provide a tree and to decorate it in St Barnabas.  We’ll be doing this next weekend, so come along and have a look at it.  Well, come along on Friday and take part in it.  There are lots of groups that contribute to this annual Christmas tree provision and decoration, with the result that St Barnabas looks splendid.

One last thing: the December meeting  will not take place.  Our next meeting will be on Monday 14^th January 2019 – 7.00 pm as usual, at St Barnabas small hall.

Well, it’s amazing how much energy it takes to find stuff out.  Apparently we at HBUF have been giving out an official postcode (for giving any blue-light services an idea of whereabouts we were) that actually belongs to Clive Parade, up near the Moonrakers.  No wonder no one could find us, using that postcode.  I rang the official Royal Mail postcode line (something like 50p a minute – correct me if I’m wrong) to find out what postcode we had.  Surprise, surprise – we can’t have a postcode as Royal Mail can’t deliver mail anywhere that doesn’t have a letter box.  Hmm.  That’s obvious, really.  So any really large areas of land have to use the postcodes that are adjacent to them.  Even somewhere as locally famous as Coate Water.  Though since that is on local maps, and is well-known locally, blue-light services would have no difficulty in finding it.  But just saying.

So the reason that we needed to know our ‘official’ postcode was that we have been looking at applying for grants to help us realise our ‘Ten Thousand Trees’ project.  It seems so straightforward, doesn’t it?  We are an urban forest – our remit is to plant trees.  Who can argue with the good reasons for planting trees?  Apparently woodland is one of those things (can it be called a ‘thing’) that promotes good mental health.  Just as (sweeping statement here, but does anyone really want me to cite chapter and verse and this study and that study?) being in a place where you can see green open spaces can promote healing.  By the way, I can find out those studies, if you wish.  It’ll just take a little longer.

‘Ten Thousand Trees’ needs to have a consultation exercise, so expect to be consulted in the near(ish) future.  ‘ish’ is a very useful suffix, isn’t it?

It is all very exciting but, at the same time, a drain on one’s patience.  Growing trees is a decades-long notion, so when I feel as though things aren’t moving fast enough, I have to remember that oak trees can live for hundreds of years, yew trees (we weren’t thinking of planting yews, by the way) can live for thousands, and willow trees can be a bloomin’ nuisance, dropping branches whenever they feel like it.

Don’t forget, all you people who live out there in the greater Gorse Hill and Pinehurst community, we have regular meetings at 7.00pm at St Barnabas small hall on the second Monday of every month (though we didn’t have a meeting in December 2017), and anyone is welcome.  You don’t have to say anything if you don’t want to, and no one will force you to do anything either.  If you enjoy the space and amenities of the Hreod Burna Urban Forest, then come and talk to us.  You could even become a member …