Bexhill Lions Club has provided funding to enable 24 local Senior, Junior and Nursery schools to have packets of special bespoke Meadow seeds with 22 varieties of wildflowers. The Seed of Hope Project has put these together with experts, specifically with pollinators in mind.
Each packet will cover approximately 6 square metres and the aim of the project is for the schools to grow a patch of wildflower meadow and use this for education of seeing pollination, recognising different species of pollinators and wildflowers, sowing, growing and maintaining the meadow. As an astonishing 97% of our wildflower meadows in the UK have been lost, creating a new pollinator habitat network is so important.
Lion George Coleman said “The schools will be able to prepare a project and sow in Spring, to be in full bloom by the Summer. There are many other benefits such as children getting out into nature for wellbeing, improving observational skills and maybe inspiring some to become ecologists, botanists etc. Also this may tie in with the possible introduction of the Natural History GCSE.”
Lion President Richard Winrow added “The seeds will be used in a wide variety of ways depending on the age groups, including being used as part of a BTECH Agriculture Course, a wild garden & eco club, a garden club and forest school, a nature garden and being used for a “skills for life” gardening club for a special needs group. One of the schools wrote “Thank you for thinking of us, the children love growing things and will learn so much from this project”
Seed of Hope CIC are a Not-For-Profit Social Enterprise who provide a range od horticultural services to improve people’s wellbeing. Their website is www.seedofhope.org.uk
To see what Bexhill Lions Club is doing, visit Bexhill Lions Facebook page or call the Club Secretary on 0345 833 9591.
