Bereaved mother organises first scarecrow trail to raise money for hospital

An Oldham mother who lost two of her babies has raised £1,000 for St Mary's Hospital by organising a large scarecrow trail in Oldham.

Poppy Devall, organised the Chadderton Scarecrow Festival, which ran from October 17 to November 1, to raise funds for the rainbow rooms at the hospital in Manchester.  

The mother-of-one explained: "As a bereaved parent, I know the need for fundraising in this field. My husband Ben and I have lost two babies prior to having our little girl who's now two and a half years old. 

"I'm now pregnant again, and am booked under St Mary's, despite not using the rainbow rooms, I wanted to make a difference to families that are experiencing pregnancy and baby loss. 

"It was our first year running the event this year and it went really well with people of all ages taking part."

She said: "I decided to start the first Chadderton Scarecrow festival for our community back in October 2025, I organised the whole thing. As we have a toddler and have previously visited the Diggle one and loved the atmosphere and how it brought everyone together. I thought it'd be great for the local community where we live in North Chadderton to do something similar, all for charity.  

"The children and local families had lots of fun making them and also hunting them all. We had 23 other scarecrow creators this year including myself. It was a learning curve; none of us had ever made a scarecrow before." 

She added: "We've just hit the £1,000 mark for the rainbow rooms at St Mary's hospital, and I couldn't be prouder." 

Poppy said she was looking forward to running the Scarecrow Festival again next year.  

However, if people wished to make further donations for the rainbow rooms, they could do so by visiting  the additional donation pay pal pool- https://www.paypal.com/pool/9u0O2HJsiF?sr=wccr 

.