Tag: Wild Ways well

Why every day should be mental health day

, by Paul Barclay
Saturday 10 October was designated World Mental Health Day, a subject that is very close to my heart. Every week Cumbernauld Living Landscape’s Wild Ways Well project runs sessions to help people experience the mental health benefits of nature. There are lots of theories why people benefit from being exposed to nature. Some think it comes from our evolutionary past,…

News: Cumbernauld Living Landscape celebrate a successful year for town’s greenspaces

, by Cumbernauld LL
The Cumbernauld Living Landscape partnership has successfully completed the first year of its ‘Creating Natural Connections’ programme. Significant improvements have been made to the town’s greenspaces, including planting of over 5600 native trees and almost 100 people taking part in green mental wellbeing programmes. The ambitious four-year programme includes a variety of projects at locations across Cumbernauld, focussed on improving…

Window wildlife-watching

, by Cumbernauld LL
Nestled in the middle of an industrial estate, I’m always amazed by how much wildlife there is to see from the Cumbernauld Living Landscape office window. As I type, I’m watching two male bullfinches potter about, their orange-pink bibs unmistakeable against the open green grass. I’ve seen flurries of visiting redwings, prancing young roe deer; and there’s always robins, starlings…

A stroll with the snowdrops

, by Paul Barclay
Cumbernauld Snowdrops, c. Katrina Martin/2020Vision Hope’s Flower, Eve’s Tears, the beautiful Fair Maids of February, the portentous Death Bell or maybe even just simple Dingle Dangles. Whatever you call them, snowdrops have arrived in Cumbernauld’s woods. Legend says that snowdrops were the only flower kind enough to share their colour with the newly made snow and thus became the only…

A new ancient tradition

, by Paul Barclay
We don’t just work to protect greenspaces here at Cumbernauld Living Landscape, we also try to engage with them at a human level, and preserve some of the ways our ancestors would have interacted with the woodlands. Recently the Wild Ways Well group went “Wassailing”. This is an ancient tradition that people believed helped woodlands to come back to life…

A wild year ahead

, by Cumbernauld Living Landscape
It’s hard to believe that we’re more than halfway through January already! Here at Cumbernauld Living Landscape it’s full steam ahead as we continue to work towards our vision of putting both people and wildlife at the heart of our town’s future. We’ve got lots of exciting projects coming up in the next 12 months, many of which you could…

Natural New Year

, by Paul Barclay
No one could fail to notice the waning of the light as the winter begins to bite and the days get ever shorter. It’s little wonder that winter is associated with depression – and that midwinter, when the sun begins to climb higher into the sky again each day became a time of celebration, reflection and renewal. The natural world…

Winter wisdom

, by Paul Barclay
Winter! That time of year when thoughts turn inwards, when we all seek respite from the cold and get ourselves cooried in until spring. The work of harvest is over and there’s time yet until planting so traditionally this was the time for storytelling. George Mackay Brown, the great Orcadian storyteller talked of tongues “touched to enchantment by starlight and…

Finding Fungi

, by Cumbernauld LL
Hearing that the nights are ‘fair drawing in’ is as predictable at this time of year as the leaves fluttering down or the sweet sound of geese above our head, but on the woodland floor something just as amazing becomes apparent. Fungi seems to be everywhere, but why is there so much of it at this time of year? Well, with…

World Mental Health Day

, by Paul Barclay
This Thursday is World Mental Health Day, a day created to promote conversations about mental health and reduce stigma. This year’s theme is ‘Mental Health Promotion and Suicide Prevention’. Countless studies have shown that spending time outdoors in natural green spaces is vital for our mental health. Our Wild Ways Well project demonstrates this as we explore Cumbernauld’s nature reserves…

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