MHA Moorland House has joined in with Derbyshire Wildlife Trusts #growdontmow challenge in a bid to help restore 30% of natural spaces by 2030. Residents have been learning about the importance of bees as natural pollinators and researching ways to make their garden more bee friendly.

The home started with a small area of their back garden, leaving it to grow wild with a helping hand seeding them with a wildflower mix and planting donated bluebells, forget-me-nots, cowslips and other native plants. 

Staff dug over an unused area to make a pumpkin and sunflower patch and Moorland House resident David 84, planted some runner beans in the hope that this will encourage more pollinators to the area.

The bee themed activities continued with residents painting bee pictures to decorate the activities room. Eileen 88, who enjoys playing the piano, has taken up painting since moving to Moorland. Eileen said, “It’s been a lovely morning painting, it’s not something I had done before coming here but I found I really enjoy it. I have chosen different colours for my bee to make it stand out”.

On World Bee Day, 20^th May, residents used recycled plastic plant pots and natural materials collected from the garden such as sticks, moss, reeds, canes and pine cones to create cosy little bee hotels for solitary bees to rest. These now hang in the garden where residents can enjoy watching them.

The end of May saw MHA Moorland House’s annual hanging basket event. In pre-Covid times relatives and friends would be invited to join residents in the garden, but due to restrictions, this year the home decided to keep it small and safe with just the residents and staff taking part. 

Activities Coordinator Amy Taylor said “It’s so important for our physical and mental health to be close to nature and here at Moorland House, we are so lucky to have a big garden to spend time in. Many of our residents are keen gardeners and have been members of conservation charities such as The Wildlife Trust so I think it’s really nice to be able to join in with these events and feel like we are giving something back to the environment.

I hope to take as many of my activities as I can outside next month as we will also be joining in with The Wildlife Trusts ‘30 Days Wild’ in June” 

During this time Moorland House will be changing the usual MHA motto of #LiveLaterLifeWell to #LiveLaterLifeWILD.

As a national charity, MHA enables people to live later life well. Through 90 specialist care homes, 70 thriving retirement living and 62 vibrant community groups and befriending, we inspire the best care and wellbeing at every stage of later life. With over 75 years’ experience we put people at the heart of everything we do in all our homes and schemes across Britain. All our donations and any surplus we generate is invested into the services we provide for our 18,500 residents and members. We have over 7,600 dedicated colleagues, supported by over 4,000 generous volunteers.