Bell’s Brae pupils continue rewilding efforts

Primary 4 pupils from Bell’s Brae School assisted staff and volunteers from Lerwick Port Authority, Shetland Amenity Trust and SSER with the latest phase of tree planting at Holmsgarth. Photo: Ben Mullay.

Pupils from Bell’s Brae Primary School have dug in to help rewilding projects with the aid of Lerwick Port Authority.

Children from p4 planted 150 trees, as part of their living things project, at Holmsgarth Brae last week.

Sponsored by Viking Energy Wind Farm, the various trees and shrubs are all hardy native species grown and supplied locally by Shetland Amenity Trust which also assisted with the planting.

The Primary four pupils said they really enjoyed the day planting trees. Pupil, Thea added “it really helps the environment”, while Noah said it “will help get carbon dioxide out of the air and give us more
oxygen.”

The class’ teacher Mrs Wishart said this was a “great way” to end work on their topic.

She said: “The children had spent the term learning about plants, animals and their habitats.

“Planting trees helped reinforce our work on biodiversity and understanding the issues to do with
climate change.”

The Lerwick Port Authority claim their paper usage is enough for 12 trees each year and since the project first began more than 500 have been planted.

Stuart Wadley, from the port authority thanked all those involved who helped for their efforts.

He added: “We were delighted to sponsor the youngsters again by providing the land, not only encouraging their interest in, and contribution to, the environment but also compensating for
our annual consumption of paper in our operations.”