VOLUNTEERS from across York and North Yorkshire have taken part in a special tree-planting day at Three Hagges Jubilee Wood near York.

They were helping to create the district’s largest new public woodland on the Escrick Park Estate.

Rosalind Forbes Adam, who chairs the Hagge Woods Trust, said she was delighted with the progress made over the weekend, when a hedge of about 400 trees was planted around the car park and nursery beds.

“Larger deciduous trees such as oak birch, cherry and crab were combined with hazel, viburnum, euonyous and other shrubby species and are designed to form a tall hedge similar to that round the car park at Sissinghurst in Kent, which particularly appealed to wood creators Lin Hawthorne and myself,” she said.

Volunteer planters included local solicitor Helen Mellors, Escrick builder Mike Luscombe, Jackie Ashcroft of Skipwith National Nature Reserve and local farmer John Ellwood.