DofE Volunteering at The Wetlands in Langley Park

🏆 Duke of Edinburgh Award - Volunteering section.

🌳🦅🐦🌷 Tonight we visited The Wetlands in Langley Park to meet Ian and David who manage and look after the nature area and are keen to support our volunteering section. They showed the group around and discussed possible jobs that the group could get involved with. It was great to meet Ian and David and they are very keen to share their skills and knowledge of the local history.

🏚🪨🔨 David told us the story of 'The Ha'penny Shed' and how it was built on the old allotment area for the nearby Langley Park pit men. The local miners donated ha'penny of their wages each week into the club fund to stock the shed full of beers where they would gather and play darts and socialise after strict licensing laws meant closing time at the local working men's club. The shed is the original build and volunteers have managed to keep it standing as a reminder of local culture. 😆

Our 9 strong DofE Bronze group have all agreed on something that they are interested in working on for their Volunteering section and John Muir Award, and Ian and David have agreed to supply the wood and tools to make their project's come to life.

Projects include;

* Building a newt hut and various bug huts,

* Building bird boxes,

* Creating new art work to replace the old ones that have weathered,

* Photography of the wild plants and animals that live and visit The Wetlands - Creating a book for visitors to view, and

* Pond maintenance.

We also took the bird-feeders that we made last week and hung them in the trees.

Bring on next week 💪😁🥰