Lots for the green-fingered in Old Town in 2022

By Jessica Durston - 26 January 2022

Community

A monthly column from Judith Randell-Sly of the Old Town Residents Association

Some dates for your diary as we look further into the new year, when hopefully we can all mix freely again.

One date you will not want to miss is the Old Town Residents’ Association plant sale, which will take place on Saturday 25 June, from 2pm to 4pm at 55 St Margaret’s Road. There are always lots of plants on offer, some of them quite unusual, but the proceeds are divided between TWIGS (Therapy work in gardens Swindon) and OTRA gardens.

The  money helps us to maintain the gardens that we look after, enabling us to buy new plants, although we do raise many of them from seed or cuttings.

If you would like to donate plants, including house plants for the sale then you can contact Linda via email in advance of the sale.

Sunday 10 July is the Old Town Open Gardens Day, from 12pm to 5.30pm and entry forms will soon be available for this.

This has now become a very popular and eagerly awaited event. This year there will also be a Front Garden competition, with judging on Sunday 3 July.

Residents will be invited to take part in various categories,  including best front garden, incorporating perennial as well as seasonal planting, best landscaped gardens, best seasonal garden with a bright display of summer annuals, best wildflower garden, best micro garden with pots or window boxes and hanging baskets.

We're also hoping to include pubs and commercial properties with the best displays.

Meanwhile the OTRA gardening group is going from strength to strength, with several new members.

Having more members enables us to look after more beds and we have recently taken on some very overgrown beds at Croft play area.

One has now been reshaped and cleared then partially replanted. We are very grateful to Rosemary Earle for her donation of plants. As the season progresses we will plant more and dig new beds.

Before Christmas we spent an afternoon at the Cambria Bridge play area, but this now needs some local volunteers to take it on. If you are interested please contact Linda.

South Swindon Parish are still planning a volunteer event, but this has been put on hold until we can safely meet inside again.

It is hoped that small groups of local volunteers will then undertake projects in their area.

We are now thinking about preparing for the Royal Horticultural Society’s It’s Your Neigh-bourhood scheme assessment in July.

If you are interested in volunteering in your locality then please contact [email protected] for more details.

More information about OTRA can be found at www.facebook.com/oldtownresidents

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