Longacre

About

As its name suggests, Longacre is an elongated acre of land (or just over) that runs alongside the railway line in Rockwell Green. When the council approached TTW to manage the land in 2019, it was an area of largely overgrown brambles, nettles and fly-tipping.

It is now a beautiful mix of wildflower meadows, wildlife areas, fruit trees and bushes, wetland areas and mown pathways.

Directions

There is only one access into the field at What3words: pigment.swordfish.mothering. From the end of Greenway Road (TA21 9DE) take the footpath which links to the bottom of Dobree Park. Turn right and you will see the gate. Or to access through Dobree Park from Exeter Road, the nearest postcode is TA21 9RT. Please consider the residents and try to either walk or cycle, parking is very limited in this residential area. If you have to drive, please park further away and walk to the gate.

Design

The team began clearing the site in 2019. Large amounts of bramble had to be cleared and taken away, and rubbish cleared from the site as far as possible. A detailed planting plan was created after a public consultation, where around 30 local people came to the first on-site meeting and over 100 people voted for ideas suggested at that first meeting using an online survey. The trees and bushes were planted in the winter 2019-2020, then two soft fruit beds added in 2020-21.

A wide variety of soft fruit, nuts and other edibles are available to forage throughout the year. Unusual berries such as jostaberries and wineberries make a nice addition to the sweet and abundant blackberries that can be found in the large, remaining bramble areas.

The central area is being maintained as a wildflower meadow, with abundant wild carrot, knapweed, yellow rattle and birds foot trefoil. Along with the wonderful local residents, the team scythe and mulch around the trees, and keep the lovely winding grassy pathways around the site mown.

There are also hibernacula for insects and reptiles dotting the site, as well as bird boxes.

Implementation

Regular community gardening sessions at Longacre are scheduled throughout the year, covering a variety of jobs: weeding, scything, raking, pruning, watering and planting. There’s always something to do, no matter what your physical capabilities, and we’re always glad of the help!

We aim to make all our gardening sessions fun and inclusive, so if you’d like to come along and help please drop us a line at community.ttw@gmail.com and check out the calendar for up-coming sessions. No need to book, and all are welcome.

Biodiversity

One of the best things you can do for wildlife in almost every situation is to create a pond. Here at Longacre there is a small pond which has been a great success and popular with local frogs!

In the dip, we have planted lots of bog plants such as marsh mallow, purple loosestrife, yellow loosestrife, meadowsweet, wild hemp agrimony and water mint.

Children from the local area helped to created a deadwood stumpery and log pile as a beetle habitat. Four boys from the local Scouts group got their gold medal by creating a reptile hibernaculum out of rockery stones. The long grasses are home to many species of crickets and grasshoppers and the rooftops nearby are often spiky with flocks starlings. Robins, wrens, sparrows, tits and woodpeckers are also often seen here.

iNaturalist Bioblitz 2024

2019

Acquired

5,313m²

Size

113

Plants Added