Entrance to Salisbury Woodland Gardens - geograph

Salisbury Woodland Gardens is an open space located in the east of

Blackpool Blackpool is a seaside resort in Lancashire, England. Located on the North West England, northwest coast of England, it is the main settlement within the Borough of Blackpool, borough also called Blackpool. The town is by the Irish Sea, betw ...

, flanked by East Park Drive and Woodside Drive and linking

Blackpool Zoo Blackpool Zoo is a zoo, owned by Parques Reunidos and located in the sea-side resort of Blackpool, Lancashire, England. It provides a home to over 1,350 animals from all over the world. History The zoo opened in 1972 on a site which had ...

with

Stanley Park Stanley Park is a public park in British Columbia, Canada that makes up the northwestern half of Vancouver's Downtown Peninsula, surrounded by waters of Burrard Inlet and English Bay. The park borders the neighbourhoods of West End and Coal ...

. Known simply as the 'Woodland Gardens' to local people, the site was acquired in 1924 by Blackpool Corporation and was originally developed as a shelter belt for the adjacent Stanley Park Golf Course. The gardens were later developed in the 1940s as an

arboretum An arboretum (plural: arboreta) in a general sense is a botanical collection composed exclusively of trees of a variety of species. Originally mostly created as a section in a larger garden or park for specimens of mostly non-local species, man ...

and public open space for all to enjoy. It was renovated in 1967 by Peter Perry and his 'Flying Squad (see below). Popular once as a wedding photograph location, the site went into decline during the 1990s. The council's Ranger Service manage and protect the gardens which they took over in September 2006 and have been funding and undertaking the restoration of the woodland. In 1967, Parks Director Norman Leach appointed gardener Pete Perry and his Flying Squad of gardeners to plant up the gardens. All plants, (primulas, meconopsis, etc.) were grown from seed in the greenhouses at Stanley Park, and planted ''en masse''. Extra shrubs, including azalea were also planted.

History

The neighbouring Blackpool Zoo site was formerly Blackpool's municipal airport. In 1927 the local council announced that an aerodrome would be built near Stanley Park, which would become Blackpool Stanley Park Airport offering flights to the

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. The airport was officially opened by then

British Prime Minister The prime minister of the United Kingdom is the head of government of the United Kingdom. The prime minister advises the sovereign on the exercise of much of the royal prerogative, chairs the Cabinet and selects its ministers. As modern p ...

Ramsay MacDonald James Ramsay MacDonald (; 12 October 18669 November 1937) was a British politician who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, the first who belonged to the Labour Party, leading minority Labour governments for nine months in 1924 ...

in 1931. However, with the opening of

Squires Gate Airport Blackpool Airport is an airport on the Fylde coast of Lancashire, England, in the Borough of Fylde, just outside the Borough of Blackpool. It was formerly known as Squires Gate Airport and Blackpool International Airport. Ownership of the air ...

a decision was made in 1936 by the

Ministry of Transport A ministry of transport or transportation is a ministry responsible for transportation within a country. It usually is administered by the ''minister for transport''. The term is also sometimes applied to the departments or other government age ...

to close the airport at Stanley Park. The airport closed a year later. During the

Second World War World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

the airport was used as a

Royal Air Force The Royal Air Force (RAF) is the United Kingdom's air and space force. It was formed towards the end of the First World War on 1 April 1918, becoming the first independent air force in the world, by regrouping the Royal Flying Corps (RFC) and ...

training station, known as ''No. 3 School of Technical Training''. The land that the airport stood on now covers Blackpool Zoo as well as a hotel and golf course. The

hangar A hangar is a building or structure designed to hold aircraft or spacecraft. Hangars are built of metal, wood, or concrete. The word ''hangar'' comes from Middle French ''hanghart'' ("enclosure near a house"), of Germanic origin, from Frankish ...

s from the old airport are still in use as the elephant enclosure for the zoo. Evidence of the area's history can also be seen today with the pill box to the east of the gardens. In April 2007 the local newspaper, the

Blackpool Gazette The ''Blackpool Gazette'' (locally marketed as simply ''The Gazette'') is an English daily newspaper based in Blackpool, Lancashire. Published every day except Sunday, it covers the towns and communities of the Fylde coast. It was founded as '' ...

confirmed that the gardens were to receive attention from Blackpool Council's Ranger Service and Arboriculture Service to restore the gardens after years of neglect. The site has been granted special status as a designated County Biological Heritage Site (BHS). A five-year site Management Plan was put in place to assist the long term maintenance of the site, protect wildlife and attract more visitors.

Landscape and Wildlife

The

woodland garden A woodland garden is a garden or section of a garden that includes large trees and is laid out so as to appear as more or less natural woodland, though it is often actually an artificial creation. Typically it includes plantings of flowering shrub ...

s contain many native and exotic trees and shrubs such as

magnolia ''Magnolia'' is a large genus of about 210 to 340The number of species in the genus ''Magnolia'' depends on the taxonomic view that one takes up. Recent molecular and morphological research shows that former genera ''Talauma'', ''Dugandiodendro ...

, Caucasian wingnut and

maple ''Acer'' () is a genus of trees and shrubs commonly known as maples. The genus is placed in the family Sapindaceae.Stevens, P. F. (2001 onwards). Angiosperm Phylogeny Website. Version 9, June 2008 nd more or less continuously updated since http ...

, enabling the visitor to view the species of many countries within a few acres of land. A number of winding footpaths run through the site and over the ornamental brooks. The site has both local and regional ecological value and was designated as a County Biological Heritage Site in 1993 for its

epiphytic An epiphyte is an organism that grows on the surface of a plant and derives its moisture and nutrients from the air, rain, water (in marine environments) or from debris accumulating around it. The plants on which epiphytes grow are called phoroph ...

flora Flora is all the plant life present in a particular region or time, generally the naturally occurring (indigenous) native plants. Sometimes bacteria and fungi are also referred to as flora, as in the terms '' gut flora'' or '' skin flora''. E ...

. A diversity of wildlife can be seen, including

kingfisher Kingfishers are a family, the Alcedinidae, of small to medium-sized, brightly colored birds in the order Coraciiformes. They have a cosmopolitan distribution, with most species found in the tropical regions of Africa, Asia, and Oceania, ...

treecreeper The treecreepers are a family, Certhiidae, of small passerine birds, widespread in wooded regions of the Northern Hemisphere and sub-Saharan Africa. The family contains eleven species in two genera, ''Certhia'' and ''Salpornis''. Their plumage is ...

s and

woodpecker Woodpeckers are part of the bird family Picidae, which also includes the piculets, wrynecks, and sapsuckers. Members of this family are found worldwide, except for Australia, New Guinea, New Zealand, Madagascar, and the extreme polar regions. ...

s. The site also supports colonies of

pipistrelle bat ''Pipistrellus'' is a genus of bats in the family Vespertilionidae and subfamily Vespertilioninae. The name of the genus is derived from the Italian word , meaning "bat" (from Latin "bird of evening, bat"). The size of the genus has been consi ...

dragonflies A dragonfly is a flying insect belonging to the infraorder Anisoptera below the order Odonata. About 3,000 extant species of true dragonfly are known. Most are tropical, with fewer species in temperate regions. Loss of wetland habitat threa ...

and

butterflies Butterflies are insects in the macrolepidopteran clade Rhopalocera from the Order (biology), order Lepidoptera, which also includes moths. Adult butterflies have large, often brightly coloured wings, and conspicuous, fluttering flight. The ...

such as orange tip and peacock. Woodlands Gardens is one of fourteen Biological Heritage Sites (BHSs) in Blackpool.

Events

A number of guided walks and children's activities are now held in the gardens by the Ranger Service, as part of the council's Park Events Programme. Events such as tree and bulb planting, bird and bat box making are held, as well as talks on trees and history. There are also a number of Volunteering projects and work days occurring on the site to enable the local community to get more involved in the sites management and interpretation.

References

External links

Blackpool Borough Council website
{{Blackpool geography Geography of Blackpool Parks and commons in Blackpool Woodland gardens

History

Landscape and Wildlife

Events

See also

References

External links