VOLUNTEERS have spent 15 years restoring a meadow to its former glory.

The painstaking process has required a soft touch, but this year for the first time the whole 14 acres could finally be mown at once.

Kidlington Parish Council donated £1,000 to the St Mary’s Field Reserve Volunteers to have the meadow mown by conservation specialists.

Then on Saturday, 20 volunteers gathered in the field to rake up the hay, shaking out the seeds to encourage wildflowers to grow next year.

Julia Trowles, 52, from Kidlington said: “It was left for 15 years to go to rack and ruin, and it has taken us another 15 years to bring it back under control.”

The volunteers’ work has not been in vain, as earlier this year an egg belonging to the rare brown hairstreak butterfly, which has been in decline, was discovered.

For the group’s next project they will invite school children to help clear areas which they can then call their own, and in the process learn more about wildflower conservation.

Picture: OX53539 Ric Mellis