On a very, very windy morning FOOPA members joined PCC employees from the City Parks Department to plant flowers around the bases of the trees in front of the Arches Studios. The tree roots had started to push up the gratings and were disturbing the lighting cables, so the decision was taken to remove the gratings and to put in plants instead.
We were delighted to find that the cabling for the lights would be replaced so that happily, we will still have our trees lit up in the evenings. The council provided the plants and FOOPA offered to help with the planting.
So, many thanks to Helen, Robert, Anna, Carl and Hannah for braving the terrible weather last Friday. We will be acquiring a water bowser and will help to keep the plants watered and weeded during the dry weather. We are hoping to grow our small group of gardeners from amongst FOOPA members and other interested local residents.
The Parks Department has allocated one of the restored flower beds in front of Nelson’s Memorial Statue in Grand Parade, to FOOPA’s tender care! At the moment we are planning to plant there on the 19th April as long as they have completed the restoration of the area. (Let us know if you would like us to contact you when they confirm the date.) We have chosen a variety of beach-loving plants that should tolerate salt winds, as well as some of the tougher herbs. All of the plants will be edible and we are hoping to trial unusual edible salt tolerant plants like samphire and salsola soda which may be of interest to local gardeners.
We do hope that a lot of members and their friends will be interested in becoming supporters of our attempts to make our environment in Old Portsmouth more pleasant for local residents and more attractive to birds and insects. Nobody needs to sign up for long tedious commitments, if there are plenty of us, we can take it in turns to water, weed and care for our new gardens. If you would like to contact us we will draw up a timetable, or you can just call and say that you would like to be involved from time to time. No pressure! (Contact details at the bottom of this item.)
Finally towards the end of April, beginning of May, the Parks staff will be planting a wild flower bank along the moat between the path at the top and the lower path. Fingers crossed, we will have a wonderful display through the summer. We are hoping that it will become a real attraction to locals and visitors.
Contact any of our committee members or call Eileen on 07548 519357 or message her at eileenmeasey@gmail.com. Become one of our FOOPA Wildlife Warriors – all are welcome.
