A green way to stay healthy

This year is the tenth anniversary of the Green Gym movement and Oxfordshire is where the idea has achieved its greatest success. Green Gyms enable people to keep fit and care for their local environment at the same time.

Since they began, 65 groups have become established across the country. It has also spread wider, with three groups setting up in Australia.

In Oxfordshire, the Wallingford group is in its fifth year and can already look back on what it has achieved. Its members have been taking part in a celebration with their neighbours - the first Green Gym in Oxfordshire - at Sonning Common.

The Wallingford and Sonning Green Gyms are among five in Oxfordshire, the county in which the organisers, the British Trust for Conservation Volunteers (BTCV), has made the biggest impact. The others are at Abingdon, Bicester and Chipping Norton and plans are under way for a sixth group at Kidlington.

GPs, nurses and health visitors think highly of the scheme and recommend it to some of their patients. It is suitable for people of any age who can work at their own pace, at any task and with support and guidance available from group leaders, who are trained by the BTCV.

The trust oversees the early stages of each new group before it becomes independent. Professional advice, however, is always available.

Wallingford's co-ordinator is Jennifer Brooker, who took over at the end of last year from Graeme Gemmell, when he moved away from the area. This Green Gym was launched in 2003 and became independent of the BTCV in 2005.

South Oxfordshire District Council has been very supportive. It provides tools and a place to store them securely. In return some of the work carried out is on the council's own land.

One interesting task has been the building of artificial otter holts, in a suitable, discreet habitat close to the River Thames. They are not approached too closely, but Jennifer says there are signs that they may be in use.

As well as holts, half-way stages for an otter to stop and rest while out on one of its longer forays for food are also needed.

"Nature provides these in such places as the hollowed-out trunk of a tree but if such features are removed over time, they need to be replaced," said Jennifer.

Seasonal work by groups can include coppicing during the winter, maintenance of trees and pathway clearance. Larger trees are left to professional forestry contractors.

Repairing fencing may be needed at any time of the year but work on hedges is strictly limited to prevent disturbing nesting birds and their autumn and winter supplies of berries.

Another activity to help wildlife has been putting up bat boxes in suitable sites.

To add to the variety of work there has also been willow soiling on the river banks to prevent erosion. The group helps build timber 'watering stations' for cattle to attract them to one point on the river bank so that they do not damage other sections.

An important task each year is removing ragwort. This all too frequently seen yellow flowering plant poses a danger for horses and farm livestock which may eat it.

Jennifer said the problem of ragwort is never-ending. Once it comes into flower it needs attention.

"However much you take it up, it seems to come back again. The pulling up tends to be done at the stage when it is flowering - you certainly don't wait for it to seed. The moment it appears in any quantity, you get going. It is quite distinctive - the pinkish stems are a good give-away."

Wallingford Green Gym has an active list of about 12 people, those who regularly turn up each Tuesday morning.

"We also circulate information to other people who have expressed an interest," said Jennifer.

"Our numbers do vary and sometimes we have a party of visitors from South Oxfordshire District Council, the Environment Agency or Defra who come out for an 'outdoor day'. They want to experience a change from just working behind a desk.

"New members are always welcome to join us," she added. They can contact the group on 01491 826157 and at jembrooker@freenet.co.uk.

There is always a job to be done, whatever the skills or fitness of the volunteer.

"People can help even by holding the screws while somebody else is repairing a gatepost," said Jennifer. "And we alternate tasks, particularly if they are of heavy work, so that we can give people a break."

Members turn out whatever the weather.

"I have known our Tuesday morning meetings to be called off once during the time I have been a member, but only once."

Paul Forrest-Jameson is area manager for the Thames and Chilterns, which covers Berkshire, Buckinghamshire and Oxfordshire, but earlier had been involved in the setting up of a Green Gym in East London.

"Its situation couldn't be more different from those in Oxfordshire," he said, "but it can be just as effective." Other areas of the capital also have their own Green Gyms.

The initial stage in setting up any new group is the identification of funding, he points out. The support of the district councils in Oxfordshire has been very valuable.

Green Gyms fit in very well with the ideals of the British Trust for Conservation Volunteers, which believes in giving people opportunities to develop life skills.

As its volunteers play their part in creating a better environment they are able to gain a greater understanding of the challenges that the environment faces.

Green Gyms open up environmental conservation volunteering to a new audience, a large proportion of whom had never been involved in such work before. And this is work that is highly enjoyable.

"We always have a lot of fun, whatever the weather, " said one volunteer. "It's a therapeutic thing, close to nature and I enjoy the friendship as well as the practical work."