West Stormont Woodland Group

West Stormont
Woodland Group

Scottish Charitable Incorporated Organisation (SCIO) SC051682

Join us today to bring Taymount Wood and Five Mile Wood into community ownership

Community Monthly Update, June 2021

Acorn update! Just one month on, look at the change in our community-grown oak seedlings! This photo, contributed by Carolyn MacDonald of Aberfeldy, shows four of the ten seedlings she has grown from acorns provided as part of WSWG's Little Acorns project. Her daughter, who is a primary school teacher in Perth, is growing another in her classroom, which we hear the children love. Really good to know so many people are enjoying being part of this project.

What has WSWG been doing this month?

  • Sorry for putting this top of the list but WSWG is still looking for a treasurer to join our new board. It’s started to hold things up so please do get in touch if you can help.
  • Tayside Biodiversity Partnership’s 21 Days of Nature Challenge – this was a wonderful thing to have been part of in May for anyone who signed up. So much fascinating information about so many aspects of our wonderful natural world, starting with hedgehogs, trying out No Mow May, hopping onto frogs, toads and other pondlife, our beloved badgers, swifts, butterflies and bees, a trip to the seashore, flying away home with ladybirds, waking to birdsong, a walk in the woods, up trees with the red squirrels, then snakes alive, bugs galore, mushrooms and much, much more. Some endangered, others not. And the simple message that every flower counts. Celebrating the UN Day of Biodiversity on 22 May too. Such a delight and such a treat to share in so much wonder. Well done to TBP and PKC Biodiversity Ambassadors for putting this amazing compilation together.
  • This month, Margaret Lear’s blog “Little Pictures, Big Pictures” gave us a real close-up look at our “Gap Site” in Five Mile Wood. What Gap Site? Nature is working miracles here! Go and see for yourselves or look out for our Summer of Nature walks and come along then.
  • Thank you also to everyone who contributed the huge number of comments in the WSWG Community Consultation Survey. So many, though, that we’re still working through the hundreds and hundreds of them to ensure appropriate inclusion in our overall Survey Report. We’ve also been poring over postcodes to be able to give special emphasis to the views of people living nearest the woods in the Stanley and Bankfoot community council areas. We will do our best to publish the full report for you this month!!
  • On 23 May, WSWG volunteers joined in the C406 Tackle Litter Group’s community litter-pick by clearing up the rubbish at the Taymount Wood car park and woodland edge. They gathered four black bags of gunk, a large pair of curtains in the ditch-water, an old TV, and more. Forestry and Land Scotland agreed to pick-up various bits of old fence-wire debris to complete the job …. for now. Along the 2.5 miles from West Tofts to Ballathie, the C406 group collected a total of 30 black bags in all. (Who? Why? What a mess! Well done to everyone who helped clean it up.) 
Litter and flying tipping collected from Taymount Wood Car Park during the C406 community litter-pick 23 May 2021

Word of the Month

Summer solstice: The summer solstice is when the sun is highest in the sky and daylight hours the longest. This year it falls on Monday 21 June, a day later than its most common date (as was the case in 2020), although it can be any date between 20 and 22 of the month. The summer solstice marks the start of summer, which lasts until the autumnal equinox, landing this year on Wednesday 22 September.

What’s coming up next?

Our “Summer of Nature” Programme in Taymount and Five Mile Woods in recognition of huge support in the Community Consultation feedback for managing the woods for climate and biodiversity, nature walks, environmental education and biodiversity surveying and recording:

  • BeeWalk Survey Scheme and Butterfly Transects – surveying transects for the Bumblebee Conservation Trust and Butterfly Conservation from June to September. Your chance to take part in national bee or butterfly surveys and adding to our knowledge of the wildlife in Taymount and Five Mile Woods at the same time. No specialist skills required. On-line training or other support will be given to help with ID. Email us if you’d like to join in or register direct with the relevant organisation. These surveys can be done on your own but can be a nice thing to do with the family or a small group of friends.
  • IRecord App – an easy way for you to record the flora and fauna you see whilst walking, running, cycling or chilling in the woods. Can be done informally at any time.
  • Bird-spotting Walk in Five Mile Wood* as part of Swift Awareness Week – Saturday 10 July, 10.00am – 12.00pm.
  • Information Walks* – join members of the WSWG Steering Group to chat about WSWG Proposals for the woods. Taymount Wood, Sunday 18 July at 2.00pm – 4.00pm Five Mile Wood, Saturday 31 July at 2.00pm – 4.00pm Taymount Wood, Saturday 7 August at 2.00pm – 4.00pm Five Mile Wood, Sunday 15 August at 2.00pm – 4.00pm

* Covid limits of numbers may apply.

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Previous Articles

Community Monthly Update – September 2024

Latest on Stanley Wildwood (Rookery Wood). You may remember that we dedicated our July Monthly Update to making the case for community ownership of Stanley Wildwood, with subsequent mailouts and Facebook posts to encourage our members and supporters to vote in PKC’s recent public consultation for a community-based future for this small but important woodland in Stanley village. We are therefore delighted to tell you that the Council has reported that 65.6% of respondents in the Stanley postcode area were in favour of a community outcome for the woodland. Thank you so much to everyone who participated in the consultation. WSWG and Tayside Woodland Partnerships are now in discussion with PKC to explore further the option of bringing the woodland into community ownership and management. We will keep you posted including ways individuals and the wider community can get involved going forward.

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Community Monthly Update – July 2024

Something quite different has cropped up for WSWG and Stanley village recently, so we have decided to make it the sole topic of our update this month and a simple appeal to you at the same time. PKC who currently own the 0.56 acre Stanley Wildwood (the Rookery wood) have decided it is surplus to their needs. They have launched an on-line consultation to find out whether the local community thinks it should be sold to a private neighbouring resident as an extension to their garden ground or sold or leased to a willing community organisation. The area owned by PKC is shown in yellow. It has had a Tree Preservation Order (TPO) since 1987. We believe the best interests of the Wildwood and rookery will be served through community not private ownership. Please support our goal by voting for Option 2 in the PKC consultation, using the link shown.

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Community Monthly Update – June 2024

Our main focus this month has been collaboration with all sorts of people and organisations in our ongoing programme of events in Taymount Wood and outreach activity for the WSWG Project. Each and every event has been a source of real joy at seeing so many people benefitting in so many ways from spending and sharing time in our lovely woodlands on a diverse range of activities. Whilst we cannot claim to have beaten the record set in 2019 for our oldest participant at a WSWG event (she was an amazing 96 years old!), at only 5 weeks old a little treasure beat the record of our youngest attendee to date by a whole 11 weeks! How cool is that? Read on to find out more about these wonderful, moving and uplifting events.

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Community Monthly Update – May 2024

We are really delighted this month to start with the announcement that the winner of the WSWG April Photography Competition in the Children’s category is Dougie from Highland Perthshire. His stunning and clever photograph was taken at the head of Loch Rannoch, looking west, on Saturday 20 April. Such a beautiful, calm scene in our precious Perthshire countryside, but just look at the perfect capture of the beautiful splash effect at its heart. A truly super photo.

Congratulations, Dougie. Thank you very much for taking part in this competition and your well-deserved prize will be making its way to you very soon.

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Community Monthly Update – April 2024

On Sunday 14 April, a lovely bunch of people turned out for a WSWG Guided Climate and Biodiversity Walk in Taymount Wood to celebrate the start of the new Perth & Kinross Climate Action Hub (PKCAH) for which funding has been secured from the Scottish Government.

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Community Monthly Update – March 2024

It is a disappointing thing to have to do, but a surprisingly rewarding thing to have done. We are talking about picking up someone else’s litter. We all know Taymount Wood car park occasionally suffers from fly tipping, but it is regular littering which is more of a chronic problem, clogging the ditches, being strewn around the verges, blown into the brambles and nettles, overgrown by rank grass, buried in the soil, or crushed by vehicles if not removed regularly.

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