There is a double cause for celebration at Rodley Nature Reserve.
Volunteers are celebrating the first anniversary of the popular Rodley Robins Nature Club, which was allows local children to discover wildlife and have fun at the reserve, and the opening of a new gazebo classroom.
Youngsters have been creating a mini-reserve away from the public to allow the children to make it their own and to do practical activities including planting flowers, building houses for birds and insects, creating a wildlife pond and learning about the birds and animals on the reserve.
The club meets once a month for children aged five to 12 and the youngsters take turns baking treats for the group at the end of the sessions.
Reserve Volunteer Denese Swann said:
“We are incredibly proud of our Rodley Robins Nature Club.
“The children have achieved a huge amount in just 12 months. We are combining our celebration with the opening of our brand new outdoor gazebo classroom, which was partly funded by The Co-op Community Fund Initiative and will enable us to do even more with the group.
“We want to say a big ‘thank you’ to all those shoppers at our three local branches who chose Rodley Nature Reserve Trust as their good cause.”
Rodley Nature Reserve was selected as one of the local organisations to benefit from the Co-op Community Fund Initiative from October 2016 to March 2017.
Donations from shoppers’ purchases at Farsley, Pudsey and Swinnow Lane Co-op food stores and Bramley Co-op Funeral care, amounted to a grand total of £3,176 following a successful nomination to the Co-op’s Community Fund by Angela Andrews, a local Co-op worker and regular reserve visitor.
The new outdoor gazebo classroom will be officially opened by a member of the Coop team.