Help wanted: Wednesday evenings at 5.00pm, and Sunday mornings at 9.00 am, watering the summer planting in the high street. All welcome.
17 May 2025.
The WiB team have started early again this morning to collect the plants from our supplier A.E Harnett & sons.
They are all being sorted ready for tomorrow plus many other jobs in the town.
16th May 2025.
A few weeks ago we heard the Perrywoods Garden Centres had very generously awarded Wickford in Bloom £1000 to be spent at Perrywood Buckhatch on sustainable planting. Yesterday Dave, Robbie and Marian were met by Kay to chose plants to put in the 3 big planters standing on the corner outside Cossons. These planters were given to Wickford by Basildon Borough Council under the Government’s urban greening scheme. We had a wonderful time browsing the plants and came away with loads of lovely plants which today were planted in the planters. We still have £600 to spend so we will be going back for more plants once the summer plants are in and we can take time to assess what we need. The aim is to ensure more planters have a framework of perennials which will provide interest and colour throughout the year. The original Basildon Borough Council Plants were relocated to our other planters.
15th May 2025
On Thursday night,, we held our AGM at the Railway Club, the committee have all remained in place and are looking forward to the year ahead. The Chairman's and treasurer reports will be uploaded to our website shortly.
13th May 2025.
The team were out in town this evening to plant a new tree in the Peacocks planter. They also straightened up the tree down by Pizza Hut. Thanks to Dave, Robbie and Graham.
All this in preparation for Sunday's summer planting event, everyone is welcome to come and lend a hand. No experience needed, just bring yourself along, some gardening gloves if you have them.
Thanks to all the lovely people who went out of their way to stop and thank us for the work we do in the town It's really appreciated and makes it all worthwhile
The New Tree in place
27th April 2025.
Wow what a busy morning we had.
A great turn out of volunteers, around 15 of us today to lift out all the spring bulbs and tidy up in preparation for summer planting.
We salvaged around 150 Hacynith and Tulip bulbs which we will use again this autumn. We also had hundreds of daffodils of various varieties. They are being dried out and will be replanted later this year at the Wick Country Park.
Thank you to everyone that helped today, thanks also to Julie and Tommy (Duke of Edinburgh award volunteering), the extra help allowed us to get it all done fairly quickly.
Next up, the summer planting schemes
March 5th 2025. Louise and Marian attended the Basildon Borough Volunteer Awards 2025 at the Towngate Theatre as WIB were nominated in several categories. We didn’t win an award but it is clear that there are a great many volunteers giving their time to all sorts of projects throughout Basildon borough. Congratulations to the winners. We weren’t allowed to take our own photos but official photos will follow.
February 19th 2025. Louise and Robbie have been out and about this morning checking the trees and planters. It is lovely to see the Spring bulbs starting to bloom.
February 12th 2025. We thought we should have a big shout out to River Crouch Conservation Trust for dealing with a recent flytipping incident along the bank of the River Crouch in Wickford. Although WiB is not part of the Trust two of our members are, and were involved in this clean up of fly tipping from residents of the flats in Lower Southend Road and the subsequent reporting to both Basildon Council and the Police. Issues like this detract from all the hard work we do to make the high street more attractive to residents.
Dumped trollies and childs bike in the river.
This was the fly tipped mess from the flats. Not very nice as there were soiled nappies and worse in the bags.
An after picture following the clean up.
18 black sacks of rubbish, awaiting Council Collection. Apparently this was far too dangerous for council workers but ok for a group of dedicated pensioners to do.
Jan 27th 2025. Louise and I had a look at the planters in the High Street this morning. We had a bit of a tidy up and are pleased to report that most of the bulbs are doing well. There are a few losses but there should be a lovely spring display in a couple of weeks time. We thought we had lost one of the trees in London Road but very pleased to say both look as if they have tiny leaf buds on them.
Jan 17th 2025. Bit of important admin as we would like to announce that as of today we have a new email address. To contact us please send your emails to wickfordinbloom@gmail.com. Messages sent to our former Virgin email address will be forwarded for the next 3 months. Many thanks go to Richard Sparks of www.ethuse.co.uk for helping us make this change. News about our new Wickford in Bloom website will be coming soon.
Dec 31st 2024. Happy new year to all our supporters. Nevermind the gloomy winter weather the days are already getting longer. The bulbs are already coming up in the planters so looking forward to a lovely spring display in a few months time.
Dec 17th 2024. Wickford in Bloom wishes our supporters a very happy Christmas and a peaceful new year. We would like to say a big thank you to all our wonderful volunteers and we look forward to seeing you all in 2025 when we start planting once again. Our work parties are advertised on our Facebook page or we can add you to our volunteer WhatsApp group. Meanwhile we have the spring bulbs to look forward to