The Great Outdoors!
The Great Outdoors
We are delighted to announce that this summer our garden centre, Country
Garden Plant Centre, will be holding a family festival, The Great Outdoors’,
together with Shropshire Wildlife Trust, in support of their ‘Scrapheap
Challenge’.
A Shropshire
scrapyard covering 6 hectares which has closed after 50 years has been bought
as a nature reserve by Shropshire Wildlife Trust. The former car breaker’s yard
is covered in 100,000 tyres, thousands of litres of disused oil and tonnes of
wing mirrors and bumpers, which will all need to be removed before it can be
restored for nature.
The scrapyard
lies upon one of Britain’s largest peatbogs, known as the Marches Mosses. This
vast and extremely wildlife-rich landscape spans nearly 950 hectares and is an
internationally important peatbog - one of the rarest habitats on earth. The
Marches Mosses are designated as a Special Area of Conservation and the
individual parts are National Nature Reserves, managed by Natural England.
In order to
return the site to a condition where wildlife can thrive, Shropshire Wildlife
Trust, with specialist help, now needs to clean acres of concrete of 50 years’
worth of waste and clear out several oil sump pits before covering the site
with peat and allowing the bog habitat to regenerate and species such as sundew
(a carnivorous plant), cotton grass and curlews to return.
The Great Outdoors festival will take place on Sunday 03rd
June, from 10am – 4pm, and will be free entry. Shropshire Wildlife Trust will
be putting on a range of children’s activities including mini beast hunt,
‘Sneaking Squirrels’, and campfire and marshmallow s’mores.
There will be stalls for all the family to enjoy, including Dr Emma
Lawrence, author and illustrator of ‘Little Nature Explorer’ children’s books,
The Shropshire Toy Shop, selling ethically sourced and fair trade traditional
toys, Clivewood Alpacas, selling alpaca products, courses and experiences, Rowton
Brewery, supplying real ales, together with many, many more!
There will also be a charity raffle:
1st Prize: Self-catering holiday accommodation for up to 6 people
between May and October in the French Alps (terms and conditions apply).
https://www.ownersdirect.co.uk/accommodation/p8050108#summary
2nd Prize Single Will Voucher worth £180 from Clarkes Law
http://www.clarkeslaw.co.uk/
3rd
Prize A £50 open voucher from
Experience Days
www.experiencedays.co.uk
The lucky
winner will be able to redeem the voucher against the experience of their
choice, whether it’s a spa day,
supercar driving experience, or an indulgent afternoon tea.
4th Prize £50
gift voucher for Country Garden Plant Centre, redeemable at the garden centre.
5th Prize A
bottle of Tanners
Claret and Tanners Gascony White wine
A huge thank you to all of these businesses for their
generous donations.
Tickets will be available shortly in our shop, at
Shropshire Wildlife Trust’s shop, and online at £2.50 each, watch this space!
The garden centre
and tearoom will be open as usual.
We hope some of our local customers will join us. We look
forwards to seeing you there!