AGM 2021

Join us in St Mary's Church hall at 7.45pm, Thursday 23rd September for our AGM. It is open to everyone who is interested, so please come along and support us. Have you thought about becoming a Trustee and helping guide the conservation and enhancement of the Pightle? We would love to meet you - no specialist skills required and it's not a large time commitment (unless you want it to be!).

The 2020 Magical Christmas Forest!

Following on from the hugely enjoyable Enchanted Forest this Summer and Spooky Forest at Halloween the Trustees of the Pightle would welcome your help to decorate some of the trees for Christmas.

After all the rain we have had recently and the recent frosts the area down by the river is a bit sticky and slidey and may not be easily accessible, or safe, for some of our younger, or older, visitors. So, we'd like to keep the decorations to the trees at the top of the Pightle and to the fence that runs alongside the footpath.

There are a lot of wild animals and birds around, as well as humans and dogs, so we don't want items that can cause hurt, that will get messy quickly or will be hard to clear up afterwards. Please do bring down:

• plastic and cloth items
• wooden decorations
• painted stones
• solar-powered plastic lights

Please don't bring:

• any glass items
• glitter, tinsel or other "streamers"
• paper or cardboard items

We hope that children (of all ages!) will use their imagination to make decorations from items out of their recycling! Wishing you all a very Merry Christmas.

Amazon Smile supports the Pightle

If you register the Pightle Trust as your favourite charity, Amazon Smile will donate a small percentage of whatever you buy through smile.amazon.co.uk to us. Please do sign up and help us when you shop - it's free!

The Enchanted Forest

A special enchanted forest has been created by children and their families. Come along and enjoy visiting the fairies in their homes and the stick families in the wooded glades. Have a picnic by the river, add your own creations and play our special version of noughts and crosses. Make a wish on the wishing tree in our own safe area during this unusual lock down summer.

You can see more on our Enchanted Forest Gallery...

New Meadows

Have you spotted the newly rotavated areas near the back path? The Pightle trustees are working with HDC to provide new meadow areas around the town. Thousands of special butterfly and bee wildflower seeds will soon be planted and we will have a wonderful display in a few months.

More Trees!

The St Neots Carbon Zero Working Group and the Grow Wild Group are planning to plant hundreds of trees in the Pightle on Sunday March 29th 2020 at 3pm. Why not come along and help!

Thankyou TK Maxx

We have been lucky enough to be given a grant by TK Maxx for our environmental work in the Pightle – litter picking, cutting back ivy and overgrown trees, restoring our camp fire area, planting a new hedge and placing bark chippings on muddy paths.

Tony's Bench

To commemorate Tony Ingle’s 100th birthday in June 2019 the volunteers placed a bench so that he could sit and spend time watching the wildlife. Tony was born in Eaton Socon and has always enjoyed his time in the Pightle.

Have A Field Day

The Pightle had a number of unusual visitors for our special afternoon! Arguably the sun was one, after a pretty poor spell in the week before, but it did us proud giving us a warm, calm day and getting people out to enjoy a wander. We were delighted to have a selection of birds from Hill Farm Birds Of Prey on show, including owls, kestrels and falcons, with a display of flying and visitors allowed to get up and close to them with their handlers.

We were also delighted to play host to the St Neots World War 1 reconstruction group History Revisited, with their horse display. Visitors were treated to demonstrations and talks about the life of a serviceman, and a good look at genuine period equipment and uniforms - very uncomfortable being thick and heavy, not designed for sunny days! Very appropriately, our poppies planted by the British Legion, scouts and guides last Remembrance Sunday were in full bloom, making a colourful backdrop.

We also let our younger visitors run loose with our stock of butterfly nets, magnifiers and identification sheets! As in provious years the challenge was to find as many interesting creatures and flowers as possible and we were presented with some wonderful collections! The Pightle always has plenty of butterflies in August and the children got a close-up look at gatekeepers, ringlets, small whites and many more. All were sent on their way unharmed, of course...

Thank you to everyone who came along, especially thse from beyond the Eatons - we hope you had an enjoyable time and we're looking forward to bringing you even more next year!

Black Poplars on the move!

December 2013: We're delighted to have successfully taken around twenty pollards from our Black Poplars in order to increase the numbers of our most rare tree locally. The majority will be leaving us to be used in the restoration of a former quarry site at Bluntisham, but some will be kept and grown on for future planting in the Eatons.

We always welcome enquiries if you would be able to give some black poplars a good home - please get in touch!

Pightle Children's Challenge

At a loose end over the long holidays? Children of all ages (from 8 to 88!) are welcome to join us for a series of challenges every Friday in August from 2pm-4pm. We'll be exercising your powers of observation as we send you looking through the flowers, trees, bugs and butterflies that call the Pightle home, armed with nets and magnifiers, to see what you can find. You may even find a species we never knew we had...

Bev White: a thankyou

Many readers will know Bev, who stepped down in February 2013 as a trustee after a number of years, including two years as Chair. We'd like to say a very big thankyou for all her hard work in that time, both outside taking care of the Pightle come rain or shine, and dealing with the management behind the scenes. Most of all, it was her persistence and determination - and wrestling with lengthy forms - that won us the AmeyCespa grant which has allowed us to do so much this year. Bev's contribution has been fantastic, and while the other Trustees will miss her we wish her every success and happiness for the future.

The Pightle receives its Field In Trust plaque

Earlier in 2012, the Pightle was awarded the Queen Elizabeth II Fields in Trust status as part of a scheme to mark the Queen's Silver Jubilee; this recognises the commitment of the community as a whole to conserving their green open spaces, and gives us extra legal safeguards against future development. In December we were provided with a commemmorative plaque - as far as we know we are the first Field In Trust in the area to receive one - and this will be mounted at the main entrance to the Pightle as a permanent reminder of this distinction. Thank you to everyone who made it possible!

Major grant news!

We're delighted to announce that our recent application for funding to the Cambridgeshire Community Foundation has been successful and we've been awarded a grant of £15,000 from the AmeyCespa Community Fund. This was only possible thanks to all our Pals who donated generously. This grant will assist enormously in providing specialist maintenance equipment, noticeboards, bird-boxes, benches, and much more.

Find the Pightle on Twitter

We have launched an account on Twitter to keep you up to date with goings on in the Pightle, from what you can see through the seasons through to campaigns. Follow @EatonsPightle to stay informed.