The sun shone on Merrist Wood in Worplesdon this weekend, as the local land-based college on Holly Lane opened its gates to the public for its long awaited, and much loved, Fleecy Frolics lambing event for the first time since the pandemic struck.
It’s been three years since Merrist Wood College has been able to welcome visitors on site for a community event as large as this. And this year, they pulled out all the stops to ensure that ticket holders across the two-day event did not leave disappointed. Over 5,000 visitors flocked to the 400-acre college campus to enjoy all that the event had to offer. 
The college’s, now traditional, annual public lambing event is a celebration of nature and countryside crafts. As well as plentiful amounts of stalls selling all kinds of local artisan products and produce, this year’s visitors were able to experience a range of activities such as sheep shearing demonstrations (over 100 hundred sheep had their summer haircut across the two-day event), tractor rides, farm visits, face painting, pony rides, countryside craft activities including willow weaving, falconry displays, and horse drawn trailer rides to name but a few. 
The opportunity to build and decorate bird boxes and feeders proved so popular that extra supplies had to be shipped in to keep up with demand! Merrist Wood staff and students were delighted to be on hand all weekend to supervise activities and help visitors.
It wasn’t all about viewing this year’s lambs, although there were plenty to see – to date, this season has seen over 160 lambs born at the farm, including five sets of triplets and a rare set of quadruplets, with
more expected over the next few days. Visitors could also interact with some of the college’s other residents in the college’s state-of-the-art Animal Management Centre and were given the chance to learn about, and handle, a range of species including rabbits, snakes, leopard geckos, bearded dragons, guinea pigs, fancy mice and hamsters – as well as being able to tour the tropical and desert biomes within the centre.
Laura Asbridge, Commercial Director at Merrist Wood College said: “We were thrilled to welcome visitors on site once again for this fun family event.
“Timed to coincide with the lambing season, Fleecy Frolics is an excellent showcase of what our fantastic college has to offer, as well as providing invaluable experience for our students.
“It was a great weekend, and our staff and students were a credit to the college. Merrist Wood is part of the local community and it’s great to be able to welcome so many people onto the campus to see all the amazing things we have here.”
