Defend the Tree Preservation Order

The landowner's objection to the Woodland Tree Preservation that currently protects Grove Wood will be considered by the Council's development control committee at 2pm on Wednesday 1st April. There are two things you can do to help.

1) Write to the Council requesting them to CONFIRM the Woodland Tree Preservation Order without any changes to it. The TPO is needed to protect the woods. The Council's own response to his objections are very strong and Snuff Mills Action Group agrees with their analysis.
You can see the Council's response and read the landowner's objections by following this link:
http://www.bristol.gov.uk/item/committeecontent/?ref=wa&code=wa003&year=2009&month=04&day=01&hour=14&minute=00
Just click on the blue bit next to Grove Wood agenda item.

Send your comments to democratic.services@bristol.gov.uk by 12noon on 31st March. Please be polite and courteous in your comments as this will go a long way with the Councillors.
Please also email us your comments so we can post it on this website for others to see - anonymously if you prefer. We will post our response to the objection to the TPO on here as soon as it is completed.

2) Protest outside the Council House at 1.40pm on April 1st - please bring banners and placards calling on the Council to stick to its guns and confirm the TPO on Grove Wood. Please let us know if you can come by emailing snuffmills@hotmail.co.uk

All of this is really important as we need to provide as much support to Councillors and show that they will be doing the right thing by protecting the trees in Grove Wood. So please make sure there are as many positive submissions supporting the TPO, by sending in a comment, however short.

Snuff Mills wildlife talk and open meeting

Nearly 60 people enjoyed local photographer and cameraman Richard Taylor Jones' fantastic talk about the wildlife in the mile around his home in Stapleton at our meeting on 23rd March. Richard has filmed badgers and foxes in people's gardens and elusive kingfishers along the river. Who'd have thought we now have ravens close to the Church or sparrowhawks hunting over Snuff Mills. Thanks to Richard for putting together such an interesting talk.

There was also an update about Snuff Mills Action Group highlighting all the Group's plans for 2009 including cleaning up the valley, renovating the garden and growing oaks and rare wild service trees for the woodland. There was also an update about the campaign to save Grove Wood which included encouragement for everyone to provide evidence for the plans to designate the area a Town Green so that we can enjoy it for all time.

Snuff Mills garden - under renovation

Thanks to a generous grant from the Co-op and our own fundraising efforts we have a magnificent £550 to spend on replanting Snuff Mills garden. Bristol City Council will match every pound we raise which means we have a total of £1100 to spend on new plants to really return the garden back to its former glory.

The garden used to be a much loved feature of Snuff Mills, alive with bulbs in Spring and full of colourful bedding plants in the Summer. These days its hard for the Council to put in as much effort in to tending its flower beds, so we are going to create a community garden instead.

Last year we cleared away lots of overgrown areas and even planted a few flowers to cheer the garden up. This year you can expect to see many more plants and colourful flowers. There will be regular gardening days throughout the year and a grand garden planting weekend in May. See the what's on section on the right hand side of this blog. We hope you'll join us for some fresh air and help make Snuff Mills a lovely place for everyone to visit.

Snuff Mills woodland project

The woodland above Snuff Mills is really valuable for wildlife and we know that many types of bird and bat breed and feed there. Badgers, foxes and deer also forage for food among the trees. The woodland mostly grew up after the quarrying ended, although the woodland above the car park was planted when the old quarry that was there was filled in.

We plan to improve Snuff Mills woodlands over the next few years by making and then putting up bird and bat boxes to encourage more of these creatures to make the woodland their home. We are also going to collect acorns and the seeds of the rare wild service tree from the valley and grow them on so that they can be planted in the woodland later. Oaks are the most valuable of trees for wildlife and we hope that a few more oaks in Snuff Mills will make it even better for nature.