MORE than 140 trees are set to be planted by a school environmental group, parents and staff as part of an initiative to improve a forest learning area in Rawtenstall.

The fruit-bearing trees will be used to teach the youngsters of St Mary’s CE Primary School about harvesting food and wildlife and to replace the fences cornering off the area.

The group have been given the trees free of charge by The Woodland Trust and the school in Haslingden Old Road is inviting residents to join them and all their youngsters for the event on Tuesday, November 18.

Kate Crane, the school’s extended services manager, said: “The pupils will all have a chance planting the saplings and hearing about the trees, and people from the community are invited to join us between 9am and 10.30am to take part or support people planting.”

The forest pre-school available to families in Rawtenstall is also in need of £18,000 in order to keep serving the community.

Wonderful Little Things, an outdoors activities group run from the school, can no longer continue providing opportunities for toddlers and pre-schoolers to explore the natural world as Lottery funding ends.

More than 60 families benefited from the six weekly session prog-rammes of outdoor story-telling, cooking, small animal hunts, den and model den building, wildlife art, mud play, flag making, leaf prints, sensory games, hide and seek and more, over the first 12 months it was running.

Kate added: “We’d also really like people to come and see what we offer here in the Wonderful Little Things project.”

To attend the event, call 01706 216407.