Reception children from St Michael’s Primary School in Dalston have planted a new wildflower area during an outdoor wildlife class courtesy of Paragon Veterinary Group.
This veterinary practice invited four and five-year-olds from the village school to their well-being garden to learn about wildlife and inviting more creatures into our gardens.
The class took place at Paragon’s Dalston practice on Thursday (25 May).
Laura Binnie, Paragon’s Small Animal Vet and Sustainability Lead, gave an outdoor lesson to the children about encouraging wildlife into our green spaces and the youngsters helped scatter wildflower seeds to create a new wildflower area.
Laura said: “It is so important to teach children about our environment and what we can do to help protect it. The climate and the biodiversity crisis is a big issue, and it is young people’s future that will be mostly impacted by it.
“At Paragon, we feel passionately about doing everything we can to help reduce this impact, and education and engagement with our community plays a part in what we are doing about this.”
In previous visits, the children have helped plant fruit trees to encourage pollinators and created shady areas, introduced pond and bog plants and learnt about which animals live where and how to look after them.
The well-being garden, which was designed and built by Paragon staff, won two RHS Cumbria in Bloom awards in 2022 and has not only encouraged wildlife into the area, but is also a pleasant and calming wellness space for staff breaks and informal meetings.
The team have worked hard to encourage wildlife to share the garden by making use of bat boxes, hedgehog hides, bug hotels and a pond, plus every May the veterinary practice takes part in ‘No Mow May’ to encourage biodiversity and attract more pollinators.
Paragon and St Michael’s are already planning their gardening jobs for next year to enrich the garden and their local environment even further.
Paragon Veterinary Group has centres at Dalston, Newbiggin near Penrith, and Wetheral and includes small animal, farm, equine and advanced breeding departments.
