THE Mayor of Worcester got his hands dirty as he joined a community group planting wildflowers at an unspoiled piece of parkland in the city.

Cllr Roger Knight along with members of the Friends of Diglis Fields, representatives from Worcester City Council’s Cleaner and Greener team and Worcestershire Wildlife Trust as well as families from the area got stuck in to plant flowers at Diglis Fields on Saturday, October 3.

The day was part of a wider project to spruce up the area and adjacent nature reserve, which was handed £665,000 by the city council’s Conservative cabinet in July.

Friends of Diglis Fields secretary Claire Edwards said she hoped this and similar projects would bring the community together as well as improving the area overall.

“This will give us something nice to look at in the spring as well as connect the nature reserve with the playing field,” she said.

“Hopefully some of the seedlings should come through in the next few weeks before they go dormant through the winter

“And then in the spring people will be able to come and see what they sowed.

“We hope it will encourage children to take an interest in their surroundings and want to learn more about the environment.”

As well as planting flowers - which should bloom in the spring next year - the team also built a large ‘bug hotel’ intended to encourage wildlife in the area from soil and bricks while youngsters got the chance to have a close look at some creepy crawlies with bug magnifiers as well as a number of other activities.

Cllr Knight said he was impressed by the work and was pleased to see neighbours coming together to improve the area both for themselves and for others.

“This is an area that hasn’t been as appreciated as much as it should,” he said

“It’s a huge green area in the middle of a city. It’s great to see people embracing it.”

As well as the planting, the city council investment is also being used to set up new boundary fencing along the field’s eastern boundary, a hard-surfaced path through the fields and new gates at all the entrances as well as marked trails throughout the adjacent Cherry Orchard nature reserve linking to the riverside.

Plans for outdoor gym equipment at the park, which were suggested last year, are not going ahead for budgetary reasons.

To find out more about the Friends of Diglis Fields visit facebook.com/Friendsofdiglisfields.