A group of volunteers are celebrating 25 years of keeping Redditch in a blooming good condition and keeping traditional skills alive.

The Council’s Mid-Week Conservation Volunteers look after wildflower meadows, plant over 500 trees a year across the Borough and have just completed their annual hedge-laying activity which saw 100m of hedge being laid.

Hedge-laying is the process of partially cutting through and then bending the stems of a line of shrubs or small trees, near ground level, without breaking them, so as to encourage them to produce new growth from the base and create a living 'stock proof fence'.

Volunteer Leader Pete Burton said: “It’s great working with like-minded people who are enthusiastic about conservation and keeping the traditions like hedge-laying alive.

“Some of the group have, like me, been here from the start and I think a quarter of century is pretty good going!”

Redditch Borough Council Leader Matt Dormer added: “Redditch has a strong sense of community of which this is a great example.

“I’d like to thank the volunteers for all of their hard work over the last quarter of a century!