South West Chilterns Rangers Young People Conservation LAF project 2019/20
Chiltern Rangers would like to thank the 475 young people and 86 adult volunteers who contributed a massive 803 hours of volunteering in the South West Chilterns. It was good to continue the work at Hog and Hollowhill, Strawberry Bank and Munces Wood that had started in our previous LAF project. We worked on a couple of new sites this year one of which was to work in the grounds of Holy Trinity Marlow School and the other was to create an allotment at West Wycombe School.
Funders:
We are grateful for the additional funding and support from the Marlow Round Table, The Woodland Trust, Lord Parmoor and BBOWT which made this project possible.
Munces Wood
At the two Munces Wood Sessions we cut back dying ash to create sunny scallops and we are looking forward to seeing the ground flora thrive in these scallops in the spring and summer. There is much more work to do here and we continue to work with the Woodland Trust to secure more funding and opportunities to engage the community here and continue the scalloping. It was great to see the Holy Marlow Trinity Pupil Premium and Hub children get a confidence boost and for us to get to know the 2nd Marlow Bottom Brownies event better at Munces as a follow up to their Arty Bird Box and planting session at Rookery Court Park in Marlow Town.
Strawberry Bank
Our Saturday Scrub Bash on the slopes of Strawberry Bank was an example of the kind of multi-generational day we love at Chiltern Rangers with 38 volunteers from Butterfly Conservation, Bucks New University Rugby Club and Green Society, 3rd Marlow Air Scouts and Chiltern Rangers joining forces to make a huge impact on walls of scrub that have been taking over this very special chalk grassland habitat. We are glad that we can do an extra session here (there is so much to do!) thanks to funding from Silicon Labs who are joining us for a Be A Ranger Team Building Day.
West Wycombe School allotment
Our In School days were a huge success. We built an allotment and restored a court yard garden at West Wycombe School with the help of a class of pupils and a group of our regular volunteers. See photos below of before and after.
Holy Trinity Marlow School
Our wildlife area build at Holy Trinity Marlow School was the biggest school session yet. We worked with all 360 pupils in a day planting native hedgerow orchards, meadows, restoring their little woodland coppice and much more. Rangers Paul and Dan needed a long sit down after that day! The children, staff and volunteers of Holy Trinity were brilliant.
