“THE birds were going bananas.” Those are the words of a Romsey woman who is furious with a school for pruning trees during the nesting season.

Victoria Burbidge, of Greatbridge Road, said this is the second year in a row The Romsey School has employed tree surgeons to work from March to the end of July. 

Mrs Burbidge, 61, wants the school to have the work done in August, October and December, meaning the nests would not be disturbed. 

The military historian has lived in her property, which backs onto the school since 1998. 

She said: “The tree surgeons were in on three occasions last year and one of them told me they are always very careful and they always check where they are working if there is a nest. They said that they uncovered a nest and then they stopped. But if the nest is uncovered, then it's disturbed. Each time they came in last year was during nesting season. This time around, they came in three days last week.

Hampshire Chronicle: Broken nesting box

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“It looked like they were reducing the height of them, but they were big branches. Doing it in holiday time makes a lot of sense, but it doesn't have to be in nesting season. They have August, October half term and two weeks at Christmas. They also have the February half term.”

Mrs Burbidge added: “We have pigeons, sparrows, blue tits and blackbirds. If the nest is uncovered the parents won't necessarily come back to the nest. These trees are all fighting for light and they are just getting very tall. 

“Whenever any work was done previously, we always used to get a letter from the school which was appreciated and made us all aware of what was happening. That hasn't happened in a long time. 

Hampshire Chronicle: Trees surrounding The Romsey School

“The noise from the work was deafening. We have held the school and the staff in very high esteem, but they have to realise that as we are their neighbours they are ours too. They have to understand that the school needs to teach children the right and wrong ways of working. Tree work during the nesting season is not necessary. It's not urgent work. 

“Not only is this infuriating in its lack of planning, it was infuriating in its lack of thought. It's incredibly distressing. When the work was happening last year, the birds were going bananas because it was days of tree work. The birds can't nest under those conditions. 

“I'm not saying no tree work, we need tree work, it had to be managed. But for the wildlife, and the birds in particular, it has to be done at the right time. This was not the right time. There was total disregard for the wildlife, it was horrible.”

The Romsey School headteacher Annie Eagle said: "The Romsey School prides itself on being at the heart of its wonderful community. We recently wrote to local residents to inform them of urgent remedial tree works that needed to be undertaken on health and safety grounds in the middle of our school site. These particular trees were identified as a hazard and required urgent removal to ensure that our students' safety remained a priority. 

"The Romsey School is fully committed to sustainability and to safeguarding the future of our planet. Prior to the treeworks we deployed The Tree Management Company (as recommended by the National Trust) to ensure that the work would be sustainably viable and to check that there were no bird nests in any of the trees. During our last tree works, the same experts found a nest in a tree and subsequently left it alone. The Romsey School has a huge tree planting scheme taking place this year, as previously reported. 

"The Romsey School values open and direct communication. As identified, before the work took place, we contacted our local residents to inform them and kindly asked our neighbours to get in touch directly if they had any concerns. We ask other members of our community to do the same using adminoffice@theromseyschool.org."