Exbury Gardens near Southampton had some unusual visitors over the Bank Holiday weekend. At the first Exbury Scarecrow Festival various schools, charities and community groups made scarecrows for the occasion.

"It was fitting that we should hold a scarecrow festival at Exbury," said Nicholas de Rothschild, whose family owns the 200-acre woodland garden. "The Worzel Gummidge film crew were based at Exbury and did much of their filming in and around the New Forest."

There were about 40 scarecrows in all and many of the charities also had stands at the gardens over the weekend to explain their work to visitors.

Particularly ingenious was a Carecrow created by The Wildlife Trusts of Hampshire and Isle of Wight. It demonstrated how even crows were cared for by nature lovers!