THE artistic skills of school children across West Devon will be included in a special commemorative book to be presented to the Queen.
The Queen is due to visit Devon in May and is to be given an apple orchard as a Golden Jubilee gift on behalf of the people of the county. The orchard will be planted on the Sandringham Estate and will consist of every variety of apple originating in Devon.
To reflect the gift, the Queen will be presented with a bound book containing illustrations of the apples drawn by children from the county.
More than 125 schools took part in a competition to provide the illustrations and the winners were chosen by a panel of judges including the Lord Lieutenant of Devon, Eric Dancer, and professional artist Michael Morgan.
Local winners were Alexandra Guy and Laura Fillan of Tavistock Primary School, 14 members of class 2 of Lydford Primary School, Oliver Kenna of Lady Modiford's Primary, Walkhampton, Connor Butcher of St Andrew's Primary School, Buckland Monachorum, Jameel Sandham of Black Torrington Primary School and Siannon Saunders of The Clinton School, Merton.
Connor Butcher, aged 8, from Buckland said he had used colouring pencils to draw a section of an apple called Pig's Nose.
'I wanted to show in pictures the life cycle of an apple so that everyone would know how it grows,' he said.
'I think the Queen will be really interested in the book and will enjoy all the pictures.'
Siannon Saunders, aged 10, from Merton said the apple project had been interesting and fun to work on.
'I really enjoyed it and feel good about winning. I am happy my picture was chosen.'
The school has an exhibition of the work they did for the project.
Major Noel Page-Turner, Deputy Lieutenant, who organised the competition and was also one of the judges, said the imagination of some of the children had surpassed all expectations.
Another of the judges, Devon art advisor Phil Creek, is now planning to mount an exhibition of all of the entries, to tour different parts of the county and possibly be staged in National Trust properties and garden centres among other locations.
Mr Creek said he congratulated all the schools which had entered, who had clearly provided 'a high level of support' for the entrants in researching the different varieties and the general history of the apple.
ANN PARSONS