SCULPTURE by the Lakes, the home and outdoor gallery of sculptor Simon Gudgeon and his wife Monique, is the setting for a new three-day Dorset Arts Festival, from 3rd to 5th July. The festival, set in and around the lakes at Pallington, near Dorchester, will be a showcase of art and music, with more than…
JUST before the lockdown, Shaftesbury Town Council’s grounds team prepared four sites across the town for sowing with wildflower seeds. The team has now planted different seeds in the trial areas at the Christy’s Lane/ Linden Park junction, a strip on the Royal Chase roundabout, the A30 Salisbury Road verge and New Road by the…
THE coronavirus pandemic arrived at a bad time for everyone and every business, including Springhead, the environmental education and cultural centre at Fontmell Magna. Springhead has been closed like so many businesses, unfortunately, says director Edward Parker, coinciding “with our busiest and most important time of the year – a time when there are usually school…
THE Gardens Group has announced plans to manage social distancing at its three garden centres in Sherborne, Poundbury and Yeovil, when the business reopens on Wednesday 13th May. Among the measures to keep shoppers and staff safe are separate entrance and exit doors, one-way systems and a limit on the number of customers on site…
A NEW ornamental grass from Wimborne-based grass specialist Knoll Gardens, Sesleria Spring Dream is a compact plant described as particularly good as dependable ground cover. Growing in compact mounds, durable and attractive, they require little maintenance, can thrive in a variety of conditions and are useful to soften edges of hard landscaping as well as…
NEARLY half a million people across the UK, including 7,878 in Dorset, spent an hour over the last weekend in January watching the birds that visit their garden or outdoor space as part of the RSPB’s Big Garden Birdwatch, counting nearly eight million birds in total. The results from the RSPB’s Big Garden Birdwatch show…
SEVEN landowners – the National Trust, Natural England, RSPB, Forestry England, Rempstone Estate, Dorset Wildlife Trust and Amphibian and Reptile Conservation – have joined forces to create the UK’s largest lowland heath National Nature Reserve on the Purbeck Heaths in Dorset. The new “super “NNR will give greater protection for wildlife in the internationally important…
JAMES Cox, show secretary of the Gillingham and Shaftesbury Show, currently scheduled for 19th August, has sent out a reminder that the closing date to book trading stands is 1st April. He says: “At this time plans continue as normal for what is expected to be a fantastic and successful Gillingham and Shaftesbury Show, with…
THE Gardens Group, which has three garden centres in Sherborne, Poundbury and Yeovil, is taking extra steps to help customers during the coronavirus crisis. The garden centres, and the Brimsmore farm-shop at Yeovil, are following the Covid19 guidelines to assist customers who have been advised to self-isolate or are following social distancing measures so that…
MORE than 50 apple trees have been planted at Montacute House, expanding orchards that provide vital habitat for wildlife in the south west. The trees are part of the Tidnor National Collection of more than 150 varieties, which was saved by the National Trust in 2016. Orchards have been planted at Barrington Court and Tintinhull…