PUPILS from Rosedale Primary School spent a wild and windy day on the moors planting the rare juniper plant.

Peter Woods, a member of the North York Moors Association, has been campaigning to save the endangered plant for several years, in conjunction with the Royal Forestry Society.

He has set up a project whereby children from schools in the Esk Valley are taken up on the moors to collect seeds and plant young bushes. "Children are the ideal custodians of the plant because it takes such a long time to mature." he said.

Juniper was a common tree after the ice age, nearly 10,000 years ago. It's been around in the North York Moors ever since, but in the last 100 years it has become more and more scarce. There are now fewer than 100 mature bushes in the whole of the North York Moors.

"I explain to the children that if us humans don't do something about it, juniper will probably die out altogether," said Peter.

The planting process is a complex one. Schoolchildren are asked to collect juniper berries from mature bushes in the Esk Valley, which are then sent to a specialist nursery called Ashlands Trees in Leeming Bar.

The nursery has the expertise to grow the plants from seed. It takes as much as eight to ten years from the collection of the seed until the plants are big enough to place back out on the moors.

"Now the children have planted some bushes, they will be able to check each summer how they are doing," said Peter. "But by the time the seeds that they have collected are ready to plant, the children will have left secondary school. This is why it is good for the school to get involved in the on-going process, so that they can plant in different areas each year and get a rolling cycle of young people interested not only in saving juniper but generally in the moors and their surroundings."

The first bushes were planted two years ago.

"We had 29 plants which we were able to get five schools in the Esk Valley to plant," said Peter. "Last year wasn't so good. This year we had 36, which meant we could go over the hill into Rosedale for Rosedale children to plant as well.

"In winter 2004-5, we will have even more, so more schools on the south side of the moors can become involved."

If any school is interested in becoming involved in the scheme, it should contact Sue Whitehouse at the Moors Centre on (01439) 770657.

Updated: 12:13 Wednesday, November 12, 2003