During the 1960s The Astley Hall Nature Trail was developed which went through the Great Wood part of the Park. The nature trail began where the River Chor cascades under the main path, here a ‘start’ timber post still exists. Further lettered posts can still be found in the woodland marking where the nature trail continued on to Ackhurst Lodge. In 2016 Friends’ volunteers identified fifteen species of plants, listed in the trail leaflet, that were that were no longer present on this route.

There were two main reasons for this happening. There had been an increase in beech trees which have dense shading leaf canopies so only allow Spring flowering wildflowers to flourish and also large areas had become covered by Himalayan Balsam which had crowded out the existing native wildflowers.

We worked with staff and pupils from Astley Park School to grow one hundred plants of each of the fifteen species of woodland wildflowers as listed below and pictured at the end of this article.

Alchemilla vulgaris (Lady’s mantle)
Anemone sylvestris (Snowdrop windflower)
Campanula trachelium (Nettle leaved bellflower)
Centaurea nigra (Knapweed)
Conopodium majus (Pignuts)
Filipendula ulmaria (Meadowsweet)
Galium molluge (Hedge bedstraw)
Geranium robertianum (Herb robert)
Geranium sylvaticum (Wood cranesbill)
Lychnis flos-cuculi (Ragged robin)
Lysimachia nemorum (Wood pimpernel)
Petasites hybridus (Butterbur)
Primula vulgaris (Primrose)
Ranunculus flammula (Lesser spearwort)
Viola riviniana (Dog violet)

In September 2016 the first batch of the woodland wildflowers were planted in Great Wood by Friends’ volunteers.

However sadly, at around this time Astley Park School had problems with vandals so it was decided that another school should be asked to participate in completing the project. Buckshaw School was approached and they agreed to help us. The school’s Gardening Club, which comprised keen young gardeners, grew six species of plants from seed amounting to about 20 trays. The seedlings were planted in the Spring of 2017.

To complement the woodland wildflower planting, beech saplings were removed by our volunteers. We are also continuing with our Balsam Bashing to control the spread of this plant in the Park.

Pictured below are the fifteen species of plant re-introduced through this project.