WEST Devon volunteers are out on the streets this week, shaking their collecting tins as part of Butterfly Week.
The fundraising campaign is to raise money for the Children's Hospice South West in Barnstaple, the only hospice in the South West specifically designed for the needs of children with life limiting conditions and their families.
Jill Farwell, founder of the hospice, said she had recently spoken to a brave mother whose son had died the previous week and who was now coping with a younger son facing the same end, the result of a grim degenerative condition.
'She talked of the comfort, emotional help and practical support received from the care team at the Children's Hospice over the last few years, and how grateful she was to know it would continue in the future.'
The services at Little Bridge House are provided free of charge, but the hospice receives no government support and is entirely dependant on public donations to raise the £1.8 million annual running costs.
The Buckland Monachorum area Friends of Children's Hospice will be in Yelverton today (Thursday) and tomorrow collecting.
Volunteers will be out with collecting tins in Tavistock.
In addition to street collections, butterfly badges will be on sale at many retail outlets in the borough. The butterfly was chosen as a fitting symbol for the short, fragile lives of children treated at the hospice.
The badges will be available until Monday next week.
And in November, the Tavistock Friends of Children's Hospice are organising a concert by the Polperro Fishermen's Choir in the Methodist Church to raise funds.
The concert takes place at 7.30pm on November 1. Tickets, priced £5, are on sale at Alan Dolan and Wilkinson's Shoe Shop in Tavistock, or on the door.