Newtown Expands Its Grape Escape

A Beatle a day…

atest press release from Newtown Tidy Towns, issued on Tuesday, February 25th 2025…

On Saturday, February 22nd volunteers from Newtown Tidy Towns and local estates in the town came together to plant fruit trees as part of their Dispersed Community Orchard.

The orchard was started last year when 80 fruit trees were planted across eight estates in the town and the local Newtown GAA club grounds.

This year the voluntary group has added another 40 fruit trees to various housing estates and the local Woodstock Educate Together National School.

“Thank you so much to everyone who came out to help us plant these apple, pear and plum trees,” said Danny Alvey, vice-chairperson of Newtown Tidy Towns. “We started this initiative last year as a great way to bring the whole community together to do something fun and beneficial to the local biodiversity.

“Thank you also to Wicklow Wolf Brewing Company and Wicklow County Council who provided the funding for the trees planted in the first year. This dispersed orchard is inspired by similar ones in Navan and Monaghan Town and the idea is to plant small pockets of fruit trees dispersed across all the estates and green areas in the town.

Can you dig it…?

“These trees will produce flowers and fruit that will benefit pollinators and birds, but can also be collected by children in the community and will hopefully teach and inspire them about growing their own food. With that in mind, we were delighted to add trees at one of the local primary schools this year and members of our Tidy Towns attended to help the children plant them.”

The location of the planted trees can be seen on a Wildflower Looped Walk created by the group three years ago for the town.

A digital version of this map is available on Google Maps here, and has already been viewed over 17,000 times by locals and visitors to the town alike.