The STAFF and pupils from a Romsey primary school were delighted to receive an extra cash boost for their gardening.

Romsey Abbey Church of England Primary School were part of Waitrose & Partners green token scheme - leading to the school to receiving more than £250.

Stephanie Schürfeld, who runs the gardening clubs for pupils at Romsey Abbey C of E Primary School, said “We won't be short of compost this year for all our sowing and propagating projects and I am pleased to say that we can finally replace the plastic on the polytunnel which ripped in the recent poor weather. In addition, we aim to buy some new gardening tools along with frames for our climbing plants and, much to the delight of the children, we will be able to buy materials to build a house for hedgehogs to rear their young."

Mrs Schürfeld added: “We are really grateful to the customers at the Romsey branch of Waitrose & Partners.

"Who chose to put their green tokens, which are part of the Waitrose Community Matters scheme, in the box for our primary school.

"As a result of the green token collection we are delighted to report that Waitrose have kindly donated £291 to the school’s Gardening Club.

"This money will be very well used to support the important work we do to help pupils to understand where much of their food actually comes from. As well as the valuable learning we do in the Gardening Club we also have great fun working together.”

Headteacher, Julie-Anne Palfrey, said “All children at the school can work in the garden during their break and lunchtimes growing fruit and vegetables and often they cook what they grow too which gives them the skills of how to grow fruits and vegetables and then how to turn them into tasty, nutritious meals.

"The children really enjoy this extra-curricular work which helps underpin the work they do in science lessons where they identify plants which grow from seeds and bulbs as well as Identify and name a variety of common wild and garden plants."