Help us to spruce up our beautiful town

And with judging for the Beautiful Fife and Beautiful Scotland competitions just around the corner, community groups and individuals are being urged to do their bit to help Kirkcaldy maintain its excellent reputation - and again be invited to enter the prestigious Britain in Bloom contest for which it won a silver gilt award last year.

Growing Kirkcaldy, the umbrella organisation set up to co-ordinate the town’s growing projects, has been flat out planting around the town to ensure it is ablaze with colour when the judges arrive in the middle of this month for the Beautiful Fife contest and a few weeks later for the Scotland event.

Its dedicated members have spent weeks filling zinc planters along the Esplanade with colourful blooms which they hope will be at their peak for the judging. Money for the planting projects came from a donation given to the group from a concert by the Langtoun Singers and Kingdom Brass in the town’s Old Kirk.

And local school pupils helped plant thousands of bulbs with Growing Kirkcaldy volunteers back in the spring time to transform the railway station embankments.

Fife Council has also been playing its part by ensuring the public spaces and EATS beds are all looking their best, and members of Kirkcaldy West Community Council recently put up dozens of hanging baskets along the length of the High Street to bring a touch of colour where it is needed most.

Alice Soper, chairman of Growing Kirkcaldy, said: “The town is starting to look really good and we hope traders, community groups and residents will do their bit to have it looking its best.”