CPRE Staffordshire Hedgerow Hero’s project

Chebsey Parish Council

Sue Stokes

357 Stone Road Stafford ST16 1LD

Tel: 07943920070 Email: chebsey.pc.clerk@gmail.com

 

 

CPRE Staffordshire, the countryside charity, has recently received funding from national CPRE’s Hedgerow Heroes project. We have ambitious plans to plant up to 4km of hedgerow around Staffordshire over the autumn and winter.

 

We are now on the look-out for suitable sites where we could organise volunteer planting events. If you are aware of any land that might be suitable for hedge-planting, please do get in touch with the Parish Council, who will forward your details to us.

 

Our funding would cover the cost of whips, tree guards, stakes, and tools. We would provide risk assessments and landowner partnership agreements and would be able to help with publicity and social media.

 

CPRE will be organising a range of hedge-planting events over the coming autumn and winter.

In March 2022, CPRE helped local farmer Graham Ashford and pupils from All Saints CE Primary School to plant 60 native saplings in a wild corner of Graham’s 13-acre farm in the village of Ranton. Thousands of individuals and groups across the country are planting trees for the Queen’s Green Canopy during the Platinum Jubilee Year.

CPRE have also helped Staffordshire University make their campus more hedgehog-friendly by extending a long section of native hedging alongside their River Trent walk. The new hedging will provide a barrier between the sports fields and the nature reserve. Trees including hazel, blackthorn, hawthorn, crab apple, oak and goat willow will provide food, cover and shelter for hedgehogs, a variety of bird species and other wildlife. In January 2023, we joined forces with the Prince’s Trust to plant trees and strip turf to create an orchard and wildlife garden on the Leek Road campus, and in March we helped farmers and landowners plant trees and hedges on their land as part of the Farming in Protected Landscapes programme.