Cheltenham is getting a new community orchard to boost biodiversity in the town.
Work on the new orchard started at the Winston Churchill Memorial Garden in March 2021, as officers from Cheltenham Borough Council teamed up with volunteers from Gloucestershire Orchard Trust to plant a variety of local tree species, including apple, plum and pear.
This comes after Glorious Cotswold Grasslands helped to plant a new wildflower meadow at the garden in 2020 – with native flower seeds including common knapweed, oxeye daisy and yellow rattle, all collected from within 20 miles of Cheltenham.
As well as boosting biodiversity and supporting local wildlife, Cheltenham Borough Council wants Cheltenham to become a carbon neutral town by 2030, with tree planting being one of the ways it hopes to achieve this.
Cabinet member for climate and communities, Councillor Max Wilkinson, said: ‘Dealing with the climate emergency and looking after nature go hand in hand and this project will do exactly that.
‘Both the wildflower areas and orchard will help improve air quality and contribute to the borough-wide 2030 carbon neutral goal while boosting nature too.’
The wildflower meadow and community orchard are both part of the Habitat Cheltenham project, which is part-funded by the European Regional Development Fund.
