Seed Collector (Avon Valley Woods)

Join us as a Seed Collector for the day in Avon Valley Woods, Devon as part of the Growing Diversity Project’s seed collection events. This project is funded by the Forestry Commission's Tree Production Innovation Fund and is a partnership between the Woodland Trust and Fellowship of the Trees. The project aims to support Community Tree Nurseries (CTN’s) to help diversify the UK’s native tree supply. We are doing this by helping CTN’s to increase the quantity and quality of trees produced by offering a series of informative webinars and training events, instructional resources, particularly for hard to grow species and funding for equipment and materials.

A key element to the project is to offer seed collecting opportunities for volunteers to learn how to collect seed and provide the nursery with a further supply of seed to process and grow.

This one-day volunteering event is facilitated by ‘Moor Trees’ (a Devon based charity - see more here.). The session will start with a quick briefing on what seed we will be collecting, how to identify species, biosecurity and site safety precautions. We will split up into groups and head off for a walk through the woods, with lots of stopping to collect seeds and berries we can find. We will usually stick to the paths, some of which may be steep or uneven. At the end of the day, we will get all the seeds together and see how much we have collected.

Seed collecting involves picking from the trees and collecting from the ground. We will be filling small buckets which will then be sorted into larger buckets at the lunch break and end of the day. We will use walking sticks and other equipment to reach higher up branches and gently bring them down to a reachable height. There will be lots of opportunities to test tree identification.