AN ECO group is hoping to reintroduce some lost plants and insects to a Borders golf course.

Peebles Biodiversity and Ecological Group (BEG) has already started adding a wildflower meadow at the 7th green at Peebles Golf Course – and the BEG members have another 40 areas on the course lined up for planting over the next few years.

The team behind the BEG – Val McKean, Les Biscomb, Denise Richards, and Neil MacIntyre – officially started the project on January 7.

Les told the Peeblesshire News that making “small changes” in the community are great for the “bigger picture”.

He said: “We should all be doing more for the ecology, we should all be planting more flowers for the bees and the bugs.

“There’s the bigger, overarching picture which is let’s do our little bit for the bigger picture, but there’s also then, let’s try and do our bit for the Scottish Borders and bring back the bugs and the animals which perhaps have lost their habitat and see if we can reintroduce them back.”

The BEG aim to help encourage birds, bats and bugs (particularly pollinators) to the area.

The golf course is on land which is owned by Peebles Common Good, which is why the BEG is keen for the group and planting to be a Peebles community initiative.

Les, a keen golfer, said: “We want to make it very much a community initiative.

“We’re making it very much accessible to the community and anyone is welcome to join, or just enjoy the walks through the golf course.”

The BEG hasn’t taken on this project alone, however.

Thanks to the Peebles Men’s Shed, more than 20 bird and bat boxes have been made so far to be placed on trees around the course.

And the group has contacted Buglife Scotland, which works to protect bugs and their habitats, to help make the course a haven for a variety of wildlife.

“We’d like to call out to organisations which have really helped us along the way and embraced our message and journey, and provided such enthusiastic help and support,” said Les.

“The Men’s Shed have been fantastic, they’ve actually been so fantastic they’ve caught us by surprise with their enthusiasm. It must be like a Ford production line because the number of bird and bat boxes that they’re producing, poor Neil’s shed can’t fit any more in.

“The Peebles Community Trust asked us to join their umbrella organisation and they can provide a lot of the financial and administration support. Buglife Scotland have been a tremendous help in guiding us in the early days for the wildflower meadow. And so many people in the community have been fantastic in supporting us too.”