A Denbigh woodland is helping give future local nature a chance to flourish.
Denbighshire County Council’s Biodiversity Team are currently carrying out seed collecting from plants and trees across the county that are rare or low in numbers.
Local provenance methods used by the team see seeds from local trees and plants grown in the Council’s Tree Nursery at St Asaph and then planted back into the county to boost numbers
These extra plants and trees will also contribute seeds going forward for future growth, ensuring a good supply of local plants and trees to increase biodiversity in the county.
This season, Denbigh’s Mount Wood has provided Blackthorn, best known known for their rich, dark fruits used to make the popular drink, sloe gin. The tree is also a rich source of food for wildlife ranging from butterflies to birds.
The wood also helped the team to secure crab apple seeds, to grow the crab apple tree that can last for 100 years and which in mythology has been associated with love and marriage.
A health supply of red campion seeds was also found enabling more of the wildflowers to be grown at the Tree Nursery. The flowers of red campion are important for various pollinating insects, including bees, butterflies and hoverflies.
Liam Blazey, Senior Biodiversity Officer explained: “We are out mainly harvesting tree seed at locations across the county as it’s come to that time of year when trees are dropping seeds. We will take these seeds gathered here at Mount Wood to the Tree Nursey where they will get planted up.
“By the end of the process these seeds collected and grown from Denbigh will be used at many conservation sites and projects across the county to help increase our tree canopy cover to support local nature and help reduce carbon emissions.
Councillor Barry Mellor, Lead Member for Environment and Transport, said: “Its great to see the woodlands and meadows we have in the county helping to provide needed growth of local trees and plants that we can return back to the lands to help boost biodiversity for Denbighshire.”
“Using local provenance is providing us with an ever-stronger source of local seeds to grow and give back to the county to help our future nature flourish for all our communities.”
