Friends of Marple Memorial Park Task Days
The Friends hold regular task days in the park on the last Saturday of each month in the winter and the middle and last Saturday from March to November. Everyone is welcome to join in for as long or as short they wish during the specified times. Please note that children and young people under 18 must be accompanied by a responsible adult.
If you are interested becoming a volunteer with us please get in touch and we will add you to our Task Day notifications.
We like to keep a record of what we get up and here are details of past task days.
Task Day 31 December 2016
The last task day of 2016 was a chance for fresh air at the end of a festive week and it was great that so many volunteers made the time, especially while there seems to be a lot of colds and flu doing the rounds. We hope those under the weather will be better soon and we'd like to say a very big thanks to everyone who has helped in the park in 2016 - it's been a good year!
On this New Year's Eve task day we focused mainly on planting the last of the bulbs we were given by the council, which included bluebells and snowdrops planted in the woodland areas and 500 hyacinths planted in various beds. We also planted some whips donated by a local resident to fill some gaps in one of the shrub bed borders, carried out maintenance along the canal-side walk and picked up four bags of litter from all corners of the park. Instead of our normal refreshments in the park, at lunchtime we headed to Samuel Oldknow's for an early start to New Year's Eve celebrations and received a warm welcome and free soft drinks. We could certainly get used to this!
Park users placed over £20 in our donation bucket, which means more than £385 has been raised this way in 2016. This money goes into our general park maintenance pot and is a most welcome boost, thank you all!
Task Day 26 November 2016
On a beautiful bright sunny morning, our volunteers planted 5,000 crocuses provided by Stockport Council to commemorate those from Stockport who lost their lives in the service of this country (all conflicts). This was part of a mass bulb planting across the borough at seven sites to represent each of Stockport's regions. It was kicked off by Cllr Sheila Bailey, Executive Member for Communities and Housing, with children from Alexandra Park Primary School, who paid their respects by planting bulbs in Alexandra Park on Armistice Day, Friday 11th November.
The 5,000 crocuses donated to Memorial Park were planted in scrolls on one side of the path, all the way from the park entrance to the main flowerbeds near to the War Memorial. This compliments the 4,000 bulbs donated by Marple and Goyt Valley Rotary to remind us about the fight against Polio that were planted in scrolls on the other side of the path last year.
Some work was also done on pruning of the shrub beds and management of the woodland walk area.
Park visitors left almost £27 in our donations bucket and we received many positive comments. For the second year running a lady also donated £50 that she insisted is spent on our volunteers, not the park itself. As last year, we will spend this on tea, coffee, cakes and snacks for our volunteers during our task day tea breaks - it should last us nearly all year!
Task Day 12 November 2016
It was all hands to clearing leaves and pruning shrub beds this time, as we prepared the park for the Remembrance Service tomorrow morning. The council has been supporting us all week too, with clearing of leaves on a daily basis, and cleaning of the flag poles, which was a tricky task! Friends of Reddish Vale Park came to our aid with the loan of a leaf blower after ours started to smoke, so thanks to them and the council for their help over the last week.
Work was also done on Jubilee, Infants Play Area and Toilet flowerbeds too.
Park visitors left over £25 in our donations bucket, which is brilliant considering the weather was pretty grotty.
Thank you to Arthur Procter for taking photos today!
Task Day 29 October 2016
A very damp day and autumn now has a firm grip with a golden display of leaves in the park - they look great but are hard work to clear! Tasks today included planting of wall flowers kindly donated by a local gardener, management of the woodland areas, tidying of flowerbeds, pruning of shrub beds, litter-picking and clearing of leaves. Also pruning of roses in the Charles Ingham Bandroom garden. Despite the damp over £12 was collected in our donations bucket, so thank you to park visitors once again!
Task Day 15 October 2016
It was most hands to the flowerbeds today as we do our best to keep everything looking good leading up to Remembrance in November. There was also some regular maintenance done on the Bandroom garden, maintenance along the canal-side woodland walk, some planting of roses in borders and the inevitable litter-picking, which is a never ending task. In addition, one of the Bowling Green benches was found to have graffiti so was given a rub-down and coat of preservative.
Around £26 was collected in our donations bucket, so thank you to park visitors!
Task Day 24 September 2016
We focused mainly on the Woodland area behind the library during today's task day but also litter picked throughout the park, shifted last year's composting leaves to make space for more later this year, trimmed shrubs in the Infants Play Area and weeded, edged and raked the French Boules Court too.
Our mini plant-sale and collection was particularly successful with over £35 being donated by visitors to the park.
