An appeal has gone out to landowners in the Devizes area who would like to create woodland for residents to enjoy.

The appeal follows the success of a tree-planting project at the Leipzig plantation on Roundway Hill by Devizes Outdoor Celebratory Arts [DOCA].

The group worked with Devizes Town Council and the Woodland Trust to plant another 80 native trees on the site, expanding on the 34 trees DOCA planted there in 2020, just before Lockdown.

“Many of the trees have been adopted by local people who have had plaques added to the tree posts. Local businesses got involved too, Gaiger Brothers donated the posts and Avon Trophies gave a discount to those who wanted to have an engraved plaque,” said DOCA artistic director Loz Samuels.

Loz added: “Nick and Jane Amer from Sarsen Celebrants performed a beautiful tree blessing ceremony for families present at the planting.

“This is such a worthwhile project and so nice to give something long lasting back to Devizes for people to enjoy for years to come. We hope people respect the newly-planted trees and look after them, it’s quite moving to walk through them and read the dedications, it has meant a huge amount to many people to be able to put a small memorial to someone they have lost or missed, especially over Lockdown.

“We hope to continue this hugely popular project, but we have now run out of space in the current location, so we are very interested to know if there are any landowners in the area who would be keen to work with us to create more woodland for people to enjoy.

“We also would like to appeal to dog walkers to tidy up after their dogs. We cleared a huge amount of dog mess from the area before planting. We urge people to pick up their dogs mess and put it in the bin provided, young children will now be walking through the trees paying respect to relatives. No one wants to tread in anything.”

If you would like to know more about the project or any other DOCA work please contact info@docadevizes.org.uk