Most of the trees which we plant are financed by Witham Town Council, Braintree District Council or Eastlight. A small number, however, are sponsored by members of the public, generally in memory of a lost loved one.
We have recently planted five of these sponsored trees in memory of four different people, three trees in a site off Flora Road where a similar tree was planted last year, one in Spa Road (in memory of Councillor Paul Ryland whose electoral area included this site) and one on the area between the Humber Estate and the football ground. This last commemorated Mr Mick Pywell, whose daughter presented us last year with three horse chestnuts which her father had grown and which are planted in the same area. In keeping with this gift we chose a variety of horse chestnut to commemorate Mr Pywell. The sponsors and other relatives and friends attended the planting of three of the trees. All sponsored trees, like all the other trees we plant, are watered and maintained for two years while they settle in – and sometimes longer if, for example, they are taking time to flourish or there is an extended period of drought.
If you are interested in sponsoring a tree to mark an event in the life of you or your loved ones or simply to increase the number of trees in the area, you can contact us on this site for the cost and other details. We can take into consideration any preference expressed by a sponsor as regards species but cannot always meet such preferences, either because the chosen species is not suitable for the site or does not fit with other planting in the area or because of supply problems. On the last point, for example, we were asked this year if we could plant an oak but no oaks are currently available from suppliers because of an infestation of oak processionary moth. In this instance it happened that we had been given an oak grown in a local garden (and therefore outside current controls on the sale of oaks) and we were able to offer this to the sponsor with no charge for the tree itself.
There is inevitably a significant lead time for any planting to allow for planning, obtaining any necessary permissions and acquiring trees and associated equipment. It may therefore be that any expressions of interest now could not be met in the current planting season; planting would then be likely to take place in Autumn 2022.
Richard Hawkes
November 2021
