Latest Forest of Avon Trust News

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Welcome to the latest Forest of Avon Trust news.

In Bristol, concern remains about budget cuts and their impact on the care of street trees and trees more widely in the city. Following on from meetings organised by Deputy Mayor: Cllr. Asher Craig, we are working with Bristol City Council, the Woodland Trust, Bristol Tree Forum and others to identify practical solutions to the problem. I am now very hopeful that these will include this charity producing an iTree Eco6 study of Bristol's trees. Working with community volunteers, this would be an important first step in galvanising a broad partnership of support for the city's trees.

The Government's 25 Year Environment Plan for England has just been launched. Whilst publicity focused on a much needed commitment to cut plastic waste, it did include some important references to Community Forests. These included commitments to: supporting Community Forests to play a leading role in urban tree planting; expanding school outreach activities delivered by Community Forests; and to draw upon the existing network of forests around our largest towns and cities under England's Community Forest programme. This is great news and a sign of re-engagement with a long-standing and successful programme: thank you all of those who helped get us this far. The next challenge is to match these commitments to resources.

More information on the above, the proposed Northern Forest and much more besides will be provided at the National Community Forest Conference, to be held in Birmingham on 22nd March and you would be very welcome to attend.

Please read on for a summary of the charity's most recent work.

Jon Clark, Executive Director, 19th January, 2018.

Image above: Trees for Learning tree planting at Bathampton Primary School.

Over the last 3 months our work has included:

Running our autumn Forest School training courses, bringing the total of qualified Forest School Leaders we have trained to 150 (each inspiring many others about the benefits of outdoor learning and environmental education).
Delivering Woodland Wellbeing activities for 2 groups of people with dementia and their carers at Conham River Park and Kings Weston. Also holding a mid-winter get-together for these groups, combining a walk in local green space, seasonal crafts and refreshments.
Running Woodland Wellbeing activities for people with learning and mental health difficulties, working with Bristol Community Links (South) and Malago Valley Conservation Group. Attendees learnt coppicing and dead hedging skills, with feedback including: 'It was a good experience, I felt really calm when out, It was good walking in the woods as I’m not always good at it and it helped my confidence.' Thank you to the Co-op Local Community Fund, which made this possible.
Planting 2,500 trees with primary schools in Avon and Swindon (and explaining their benefits) as part of the Defra-funded Trees for Learning project;
Supporting the Malago Valley Conservation Group to lead a coppicing day for TSB volunteers and organising training days for 2 other woodland groups.
Planting 7 orchards with local school-children as part of the 2017/ 18 Schools Orchard project, again kindly funded by Western Power Distribution.
Producing a management strategy/ investment plan for Abbot's Wood, Keynsham for BathNES Council.
Co-ordinating and submitting a project proposal for the Trees outside Woods programme.
Working with long-term sponsor Pukka Herbs on a really successful 'Black Friday' fundraising event;
Continuing to grow our presence on Twitter and Facebook, also producing regular blogs (curated by Professor Emeritus William Scott), promoting our charitable activities and services.
Look out for Professor Scott and Paul Vare's new book identifying the main sustainability issues/ challenges we now face and discussing strategies to address these, (discount code FLR40).

There are many great ways to support our work:

If you have a project idea, please email me at: jonclark@forestofavontrust.org or join us as a Friend from just £3/ month. Click on the icons below to access details of this and our other supporter schemes.