On 18th September 2025 I headed to the Methodist Church with my entries for the village show. (Since you ask, on Saturday I found out that I had been knocked off my second-place perch for jam! To 3rd place, sadly.) It was impossible to miss the magnificent scarecrow window painting in the Community Library, and I knew the festival was going to be great! Residents and groups had risen to the invitation to build a scarecrow of any theme and build them you did.

From Lime Tree’s wonderful display of 1940s themed scarecrows including a spitfire, to the ‘Idle Woman’ Scarecrow by Deep Lock (which
came with its own history lesson – a waterways version of the Land Girl) to little George’s fantastic scarecrow, our village was visited by a wonderful selection of scarecrows. The Scouts must have been building them for weeks, they didn’t have one scarecrow, they had a whole display, as did Lime Tree Nursery. I was told, proudly, by one of the Lime Tree personnel that all their scarecrows had input from the children. Hall Orchard had evacuee scarecrows at the school gate, Bluey was on Thirlmere, and the Playgroup scarecrow was the Hungry Caterpillar.

As I was leaving the Scout Hut I overheard a little boy say to his mum, “There’s something going on in there!” And he was quite right: there was!

The People’s Choice Award went to Steve Ballard on Sileby Road who told me the scarecrow had been a family affair with the little one contributing fish. Just as it should be!

How many other scarecrows can you find hiding in this issue of Barrow Voice?

Thank you so much to all of you - it was a wonderful display.

I’ve been trying to think of a collective noun for Scarecrows. How about a scrum?

So, the Scrum for next year will be Barrow Does Disney. Time to get your thinking caps on…

Helen Sadler

The Scarecrow Festival was a BUSCA organised event.