Sheffield volunteers plant wild flowers in park and playground - here's how to get involved

Green shoots are springing up in two patches around the basketball court at Mount Pleasant Park and wild flowers are beginning to grow by the entrance to Highfield Adventure Playground.

These are the early fruits of Wild Sharrow’s first volunteer planting day, which was held on Friday, April 23, with the support of the adventure playground, Sharrow Community Forum and the Sheffield City Council parks team.

Maria Kelly, operations manager at Sharrow Community Forum, said: “Two teams of volunteers pitched in on the day with wheelbarrows, rakes and a lot of good will to shift the soil, smoothe it down and scatter the seeds.

"With the help of Pictorial Meadows we had sourced three different wild flower mixes so that we could trial three different types of meadow planting.

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“Sheffield City Council’s parks team rotovated the patch outside Sharrow School, where we planted annual seeds. The small patch outside Highfield Adventure Playgroup is a turf, which we rolled out like a carpet and chopped to size with shovels.

“For our final patch, outside the children’s playground, our volunteers shovelled and transported a big heap of compost across the park, and spread it across the plot, before scattering perennial seeds.

“These plants will be slower to emerge, and might be less bright this year, but will continue to develop over the next couple of years.

Wild Sharrow has put together and distributed sunflower growing packs to children and households across Sharrow. Look out for sunflowers growing in front gardens and window boxes over the coming weeks.

A community lunch has been organised on Saturday, July 24 at noon in Mount Pleasant Park, when there will be activities, planting and food to share.

Maria asked: “Do you have some time, or skills, that you could share to help create a wilder Sharrow? We are a small team of volunteers and would love to hear from you.”

They would also love to see any pictures of your garden flowers, or of you enjoying the wild flowers in the park. Email [email protected] to ask for information or send pictures.