Planting trees and building connections with Ribble Rivers Trust

With so much on our plates, we often find ourselves getting wrapped up in daily routines and responsibilities, meaning it’s very easy to forget the incredible benefits of being outdoors. That’s why recently, alongside my colleague Chris White, we created an opportunity for people from Heywood to take a break from busy work diaries, Teams meetings and day-to-day tasks, by organising a rewarding volunteering project with Ribble Rivers Trust.

Heywood’s spring volunteering day

In late March, on an unseasonably mild day, we swapped our laptops for shovels and spent the day tree planting along the riverbanks at a site called Cow Ark near Clitheroe. The day was a huge success as alongside the good weather, plus the road trip and a pub lunch break, we successfully planted a remarkable 667 trees!

It was great to bond as a team, and we even had help from a lovely landowner who lived nearby who got stuck in amongst us all, which was great!

It wasn’t my first time volunteering with Ribble Rivers Trust, so I found it incredibly rewarding on a personal level to spend more time with some of the team—like Charlotte and Rob from the Trust—as well as Janet, the landowner at the planting site. As anyone that knows me will attest, I love nothing more than interacting with others, listening to others and hearing their stories.

During previous events, the interaction with others has always been one of the main highlights for me; having the opportunity to get to know a handful of my colleagues on a more personal level – an opportunity I would not have it weren’t for our volunteering days. They really do help us to engage through teamwork, and often with people we don’t typically interact with on a daily or even monthly basis, so I enjoyed that dearly.

After some lovely conversations through the day with Janet I was surprised to find out that the landowner that accompanied us was the daughter of Ribble Rivers Trust’s president Philip Lord who, for over 20 years, was the Chair of Ribble Rivers Trust. She informed me that Philip oversaw the charity’s growth from a small group of volunteers who were acting in the interests of their fishing prospects, to a 30 strong team of environmental professionals delivering multimillion pound grant funded river improvement projects…bravo – an unbelievable effort I thought!

Some interesting Ribble facts

• Ribble Rivers Trust is a Lancashire based charity working to improve the River Ribble and all its tributaries for both people and wildlife. For over 25 years they have been working with the people who live in this area to deliver river improvements across the entire Ribble catchment.
• In the past, industrial and agricultural pollution as well as water abstraction for drinking water and poor sewage treatment have caused severe habitat damage to the Ribble catchment. Because of the extent of this the wildlife our rivers support is under threat. The Trust was established to improve the water environments of the catchment. Their goal is to restore and protect the river to make sure current and future generations can enjoy the beauty of its wildlife and fauna.
• Ribble Rivers Trust follows the Catchment Based Approach (CaBA) to river conservation. This approach looks after rivers by understanding that everything is connected – rainwater flows downhill through farms and towns, roads and industrial areas, picking up a range of pollutants and harmful substances, before reaching a river and depositing all these materials. By working together to manage and re-naturalise this whole journey, they can keep rivers cleaner, healthier, and better for wildlife and people.
• The 667 trees planted on the day include alder, black alder, blackthorn, common holly, crab apple, dogwood, elder, English oak, goat willow, grey willow, hawthorn, hazel, hornbeam, wild cherry. A high proportion of the trees we planted were the thorny species - hawthorn, blackthorn and holly. The hedgerow we planted is one of several improvements that the Trust are working on at the site.

It’s not just tree planting...

The Trust also supports the habitat through:

• a small woodland- delivering wildlife habitats, natural flood management benefits, improving air and water quality, and capturing carbon.
• a wetland - creating wildlife habitat, providing natural flood management benefits, and improving water quality.
• wader scrapes - temporary wetlands which are full of water in winter and wet weather periods, but become boggy wet patches in summer, these benefit wading birds such as curlew, lapwing, redshank, and oystercatcher
• meadow reinstatement - transforming the monoculture grassland into species rich grassland, which benefits insects including bees, butterflies, and other pollinators

Thank you!

A huge thanks to Heywood for giving us the opportunity to spend time out of the office helping supporting good causes, and the team who we’ve worked closely with from the start of this tree-mendous journey together since 2023.

• Charlotte Ireland Pope - Charlotte is a fundraising officer at Ribble Rivers Trust. Generally, Charlotte’s day-to-day work involves building relationships with corporate partners and individuals, to raise money for the Trust. Charlotte also creates web content and blog posts, manages the Trust’s social media channels, and helps to organise press and publicity opportunities. Charlotte is the glue that keeps Ribble and Heywood together!
• Rob Cooper - Rob joined the team many years ago as an apprentice through the Ribble Life Together project. Rob then went onto work as a volunteer coordinator, before changing roles to take on a project management role, delivering river restoration projects including the work at Cow Ark.

After another successful day supporting Ribble Rivers Trust, I’d encourage anyone to get involved in future volunteering events. We’re all busy, but these days aren’t just about making a difference to the environment—they also nurture positive emotions like calmness, joy and creativity. Being outdoors with nature has proven benefits, including better focus and wellbeing, all of which contribute to a more vibrant working culture.