The AGM of the Trust is to be held on Thursday 14th October at 7.00pm, followed by an Open Meeting at 7.30pm.
As our usual venue is not yet available, we are holding the meetings at St Cuthbert’s Church Hall
Members, guests and residents are all welcome.
Thanks once again to our County Councillors, Peter & Stephen, for providing a grant from their Neighbourhood Budgets to continue planting up the tubs in the conservation area with bulbs and plants for spring and summer next year.
Here is a selection of photos showing some of the tubs in bloom this spring.
This morning two dozen volunteers from the Village Trust helped plant the village tubs with over 600 polyanthus, together with tulip, daffodil, crocus and grape hyacinth bulbs.
Thank you to our local councillors for providing the funding from their DCC neighbourhood budget and to Beveridge’s Nursery for supplying the plants.
We managed to do all the planting before the rain set in.
At the beginning of August the summer bedding in the tubs and barrier baskets were looking very colourful.
Also two new seats have been put in the ‘triangle’ to replace the deteriorating wooden seats. The bespoke design of the new seats commemorate the lives lost in the First World War and the industrial past of Shotley Bridge. They were paid for with the remaining S106 monies from the Story Homes housing development at the hospital.
Last Sunday morning volunteers planted the summer bedding in the village, which had been postponed from the day before due to the wet and windy weather forecast. All the Trust’s tubs and planters were successfully planted with a mixture of Salvia, Geraniums, Dahlia, Petunia, Bidens and Lobelia from Beverages Nurseries.
Thank you to the 24 volunteers and to George Ledger for taking the photographs, who is currently trying to record the Covid-19 Lockdown and its affects on people locally. This year, to ensure social distancing, the committee of 6 decided to sort then transfer the plants to each of the tubs to make it safer for the volunteers to plant.
To add a little cheer during the coronavirus outbreak here are a few photos of the beds and tubs in the village that were planted by the Village Trust volunteers, in bloom with spring bulbs and flowers …
On Saturday morning volunteers from the Village Trust planted up over 50 tubs with tulips, daffodils, crocus and grape hyacinth bulbs together with polyanthus plants.
Thank you to our local councillors and the Project Genesis Trust for providing the funding.
The photos show just a few of the volunteers getting wet!
The next Open Meeting of the Trust is to be held on Tuesday 8th October at 7.30pm. Members, guests and residents all welcome.
At the AGM a cheque was presented by John O’Connor, Chairman of the Project Genesis Trust, to Sue Shaw, Secretary of the Trust’s Blooming Shotley Bridge group. The funding was made available from the Project Genesis Trust Small Grants Fund.
A similar amount has also been granted from County Councillor Robinson’s Neighbourhood Budget.
Both grants will now enable the Trust to replant the tubs and planters, throughout the conservation area, with summer and winter bedding this year.
The next meeting of the Trust will be on Tuesday 9th April.
Members and residents all welcome.
Half a dozen Trust members spent a couple of hours this morning collecting debris, moss and leaves from the Triangle in the centre of the village. The block paving around the history board has been cleared of moss and weeds. Eighteen bags of compostable materials were removed, for the council to collect.
Thank you to the volunteers and to Isabella’s who provided complimentary coffees on completion.
The council intend cleaning the moss from the tarmac areas and repainting the fencing and furniture. Two new seats are also to be provided with the last of the S106 money from the Storey Homes development on the former hospital site.
The Purple4Polio croci are flowering a month earlier this year, because of the mild weather. These are the 5000 bulbs planted in 2017 by the Village Trust provided by Consett Rotary Club. Another 5000 more bulbs were planted last November but these are only just starting to peep through.
The purple crocus is a symbol of Rotary’s worldwide campaign to eradicate polio, with its colour representing the purple dye used to mark the finger of a child to indicate they have received their life saving oral polio vaccine.
More information can be found on the Rotary website
Consett Rotary Club has given the Trust another 5000 crocus bulbs, to plant in the village.
They have been planted further along the grass verge in front of Riverside, around the Pant and in the verge at Snows Green.
Ten members of the Trust and members of Consett Rotary, who provided the bulbs, volunteered for a couple of hours.
The purple crocus is a symbol of Rotary’s worldwide campaign to eradicate polio, with its colour representing the purple dye used to mark the finger of a child to indicate they have received their life saving oral polio vaccine.
More information can be found on the Rotary website.
The next meeting of the Trust will be on Tuesday 16th October. Susan Nolan from CEED will be explaining about their ‘Street Trees’ project. Members and residents all welcome.
Thank you to the 8 Trust members who came to the working party on Friday morning to weed the tubs, beds, triangle and paths in the village centre. The place is looking much more cared for now.
This morning the Trust’s volunteers planted the summer bedding in tubs and planters, within the conservation area. Thank you to those that helped and Beveridge’s for supplying and delivering the plants.
We are trying out a more experimental mixture of plants this summer, in the hope of adding more variety. We hope you like the difference.
The next Open Meeting of the Trust on 5th June will be preceded by the Annual General Meeting. Everyone welcome.
On Friday, volunteers from the Village Trust were maintaining the sustainable beds in the village centre that the Trust has adopted. The spring bedding in some of our tubs was in full bloom, too.
Last October volunteers from the Trust planted 5000 purple crocus bulbs on the verge opposite Rumi’s. They had been provided by Consett Rotary Club to raise awareness of its ‘Purple for Polio’ national campaign.
A couple of weeks ago just a handful of crocus were visible, but the warmer weather following the ‘Beast from the East’ has led to the start of blooming. A bit more sunshine over the next few days should ensure a wonderful Easter display, provided children and dogs don’t trample the flowers.
Shotley Bridge Village Trust 