Forest Harvest was awarded a grant from Severn Trent for a planting project in the Festival Garden - the section of open space by the stream between Queen St and the clock tower. Nick Burton, current Open Spaces officer for LCC and Forest Harvest Director explained: 
“The project is threefold: 

1. Planting plugs of yellow rattle in the meadow. When established this parasitic plant will reduce the strength of the grasses and allow wildflowers to increase. 

1. Planting some different coloured willow above where the brook tends to flood. When coppiced it will provide material for some community willow weaving. 

1. Plant 3 ‘forest garden guilds’ in the meadow behind the notice board. These are a collection of mutually supportive shrubs around a central fruiting tree. This is a novel idea for wilding up but with less “wild”. Each guild of plants is around 7m diameter so not overbearing.” 

 
A small number of socially distanced Transition members assisted with the first stage of planting and volunteers are welcome mid-April for the next stage of planting and beyond, to help with on-going maintenance. ​

Each month, we want to focus on one of the community groups or enterprises. This month is the turn of:  ​

Established by Samantha Paddock in 2019 to provide a zero waste shopping option for local people. Sam said “Our aim is to offer people plastic-free alternatives to their usual products, locally sourced whenever we can. We are trying to keep the carbon footprint of our products as low as possible.”
The business has grown from a small selection of refill type products to a beautiful shop with a great range of products, a café and soon to be deli at the Plant Plot Garden Centre. Take a look at the website for details of the items they stock – fresh fruit and veg, eggs, dry loose goods, full range of household liquids for cleaning and selfcare, frozen goods and some amazing bars of chocolate too!! And that’s just a few of the items!
The team have some amazing tips and ideas to share and are open to ideas from their customers too.
A big round of applause to Sam for getting this established and continuing throughout the pandemic, with deliveries to vulnerable people to add into the mix. Please do support these valuable small local businesses whenever you can.

A useful tool for mapping is Greenmap. There are bound to be others – Sum App is another we have come across but there is not much information about them out there.  
Could you help get this off the ground? Email us if you are interested in helping. 

Gardening/planting Projects 
We have come across Burton Conservation Volunteers. Although the name suggests that they are a Burton group, they do in fact work on projects in Lichfield. Do visit their website but the best contact is Lawrence Oates bcvflowerman@gmail.com  07432 608931 if you think you might want to join in.  

 Lawrence said “ You need to be happy to be included on a general email list. Post code and description of each job will be included, and any special requirements, like wellingtons. All jobs are risk assessed and a task sheet produced, kept on site when we work, in case I am on a different part of the site. Tools are provided and we do our best to give volunteers the how and why of the jobs we are carrying out.  Jobs are tailored to the volunteers requirement, so if they just want a day’s work doing good, then this is kept to a minimum, if they are studying a related subject, then they can have more in depth tuition.” 

It was useful to have a catch up with Lyn Hammant of the LDC Parks dept recently as Lyn was able to remind us of activities and groups that are ongoing and which people may want to participate in. 

The Countryside and Parks Conservation Group (CPCG) is made up of volunteers who want to help out in their district on conservation projects, working alongside Parks Dept staff. There are other ways you can get involved too, with park maintenance, helping with events or helping in the community garden. More info here. 

Contact the Parks team on parks@lichfielddc.gov.uk  if you would like to get involved with any of their groups or fill in their volunteering form online. 

And if you want to see more about biodiversity across the District and the sorts of projects that have taken place, take a look at the Parks & Countryside page on the District Council’s website. It is an interesting read! 
​
This Guardian article is a useful quick read if you want some ideas of planting that can help reduce air pollution. Something that we can all be doing, especially those of us who live by busy roads. ​

25th-26th March is the Global Festival of Action! A virtual festival, full of interaction and entertainment. Register to take part. 
27th March 8.30pm - Earth Hour. Join in with others across the world with your lights off and use as little power as you can.  
20th- 22nd April is the annual Earth Day event– 3 days of Climate Action. 
We have been invited to take part in the Green Gathering, being held virtually on Sat 5th June, and then in person on Sat 4th September in Stafford. Any ideas of how to contribute would be welcomed but one thought is to talk about the small things that people can do, simple changes that the whole family can adopt, as well as getting to know their community and working together. 
We welcome your suggestions for newsletter content, for Transition group projects and events, for groups that should be listed on our website and for useful connections. 
Forthcoming topics include ethical investing and support for businesses to become sustainable and reach NetZero carbon. 
Stay safe! We look forward to engaging with you. 
Thank you for reading. ​

Typically we would recommend that activities are the best gift as opposed to material items, they are more likely to leave lasting memories, however time with our loved ones is currently restricted. We may chose instead to support our local businesses and send our family and friends a voucher or a little something.
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For our general tips and ideas on a "Plastic Free Christmas" and our "Ethical Shopping guide" check out the Resources part of the website.

We have done some research and found 30 items under £30 from local businesses, the majority are in Lichfield, some extend to Birmingham.

These items have been especially selected as they have been made with eco friendly, recyclable materials, are handmade, ethically sourced or are charity items. Leave us a comment and tell us your favourites!