Moorsholm in Bloom participated in The Big Sunflower Project for the first time in 2014. Below they write about taking part.
Moorsholm is a village on the edge of the North York Moors. Its name is of Viking origin and means a Moor. RHS Britain in Bloom began in 1964 and today is one of Europe’s largest horticultural campaigns with more than 1,600 cities, towns, villages and urban communities participating each year to show off their achievements in environmental responsibility, community participation and horticultural achievement. Barbra from the groups says:
Moorsholm in Bloom was formed in 2009 as a volunteer group mainly working in the grounds of St Mary’s Church. We found out about the work of The Information Point quite by chance but were really keen to show our support. Coincidentally the RHS were also using sunflowers in their campaigns to celebrate their 50th anniversary and we had to grow a really large batch of them, so we organised a seed sowing morning with the children in our Little Planters group as we had decided to use the seeds given to us by the Information Point in our community garden. The sunflowers were sown into fibre pots which can be planted straight into the ground without any disturbance but disaster struck just as our little seedlings were growing well. They were just such a tasty snack for the armies of slugs which have been around this year.
A second batch was quickly sown and the pots set on sharp grit which did the trick. Lovely healthy plants went into the ground in early June and they grew happily over the next few weeks. We grew Russian Giants together with a smaller variety called Teddybear. They have been fabulous growing to about ten feet high and admired by villagers, visitors and the National RHS judges who had their photos taken with them. We gave them a bit of company in the form of our anniversary scarecrows Roy and Al who loved sitting amongst the flowers.
The Information point is doing a great job in highlighting their work and we are proud to support them.
The Big Sunflower Project 