Volunteer-led amateur gardening group is digging deep to brighten up a local village

Blooming Inverkip recently held its second drop-in session after two years of work to get the group together.

Robert Russell, 45, is one of six people in the steering committee working to get it off the ground.

He became a keen gardener as he found it helped him cope with epilepsy.

He said: “My epilepsy really affected me and found solace in my own garden.

"I am really glad that this is up and running.

“I am hopeful we can work to brighten up the local area.

“We want to bring a bit of beauty to the local area.

"Gardening has a really positive effect on health and wellbeing.

“Our sessions are advertised on social media and are open to all ages and abilities, it is a way to get people together and give everyone a chance to try gardening.”

The most recent session at the hub saw 25 members of the public turn out to help plant window baskets, clear weeds, plant flowers and they also took home strawberry plants.

Robert said: “It went really well and half of the volunteers were children.

“The enthusiasm from the kids was great and we think they enjoyed themselves.

“The weather was kind to us and after a break we planted some potatoes in big black bags.

"We labelled some of the planters with the kids' names and some of the adults did a great job of clearing out weeds from the hedging.”

Now the group are looking to set up a proper committee and will continue to run planting sessions.

They are hoping to set up a People's Border where the local community can leave their own plants and watch them grow.

Anyone interested in finding out more is asked to visit the Blooming Inverkip Facebook page.