Bourton on the Water

On our visit in March 2026 we teamed up with seven corporate volunteers from Sozo Design, a company from Cheltenham who had volunteered with us before, to restock, planting 150 trees across the site. We recycled the stakes and guards from trees that had to be replaced, and everyone showed great teamwork throughout.

Work included digging holes for new trees, planting, and putting up stakes and guards, with all the volunteers getting trained up and refreshed on tree-planting techniques. A big thank you to everyone who came out, and to Peter for the very appreciated tea and biscuits!

When we return for our next survey, we’ll check how these new saplings are getting on, as well as looking at how the site is progressing as a whole.

Our visit shows generally good establishment across the site, with an overall survival rate of 76%. Many of the failures here are showing brown leaves and drying stems. This is largely attributed to dry conditions, with the ground being very parched and cracked at the time of inspection.

Wildlife activity was also recorded during the visit, including yellowhammers, linnets, goldfinches and song thrushes, indicating positive early habitat use.

Woodland areas have been established in field corners along with a new shelterbelt, which will provide additional habitat and connectivity for these and other species typical of Cotswold farmland.

In February, 2025 Steve led a group of volunteers from the Bourton-on-the-Water branch of Zenergi to plant 125 new trees to replace those lost in the previous year. They also carried out some general maintenance, removing grass from inside guards, and replacing or repairing damaged guards and stakes as required.

There were some very pregnant sheep in some of the nearby fields so the volunteers were a little quieter than usual, and were careful not to spook them into an early labour.

There were quite a few brambles to contend with amongst the grass but the group worked really hard and even managed to finish early.

The volunteers said “We loved the day planting with you! Thank you for the opportunity. The landowner was very friendly and hospitable, opening his home to us and providing us with pots of tea & coffee and snacks.”

The landowner was equally enthusastic. “It all went marvellously, as far as I am concerned. And I am glad the volunteers had a good time. They sent me some photos and I have done a post about it in my social media. It mentions Protect Earth and all they have done, for which we are very grateful!”

We spent the day planting two 100m shelterbelts, and a small woodland in the corner of the field, using spirals and canes for the shrubs and and stakes and mainly cardboard guards for the trees. The weather was cold, but bright and sunny, which was perfect for the videos taken using a drone.

The volunteers did a great job and managed to get it all done in one day.