ALLOTMENTS which have been used for 150 years are under threat of closure.

Around 60 allotments, some of them gardened by the same person for over 50 years, could be closed at Blockley Allotments.

This is because, Parham Park Trust, which own the Blockley Allotments site, are considering moving the allotment site according to a plotholder who did not wish to be named.

The plan comes as the trust want to sell the land to a developer to build on.

Allotment holders in Blockley, the last allotments in the parish, are being offered alternative land in Blockley above the site, but many of the gardeners say the land has not got the richness of soil to offer good growing quality.

A plotholder said: "It would be such a shame to lose the allotments, we have been offered other land but it is scrub.

"The local plan has Blockley Allotments as one of the few designated green spaces in the North Cotswolds but this is taking so long to go through."

The Blockley Allotment Association has gardened the 4.6 acre site on Station Road since at least 1870.

The land was owned by the Northwick Park estate and inherited by the local Spencer-Churchill family who allowed the allotments to use the land in return for tiny rents.

However when the last owner of the land, Mrs Veronica Tritton, died in 1993 a charitable family trust, the Parham Park Trust, took it over.

This trust exists to maintain an Elizabethan manor house in Sussex, Parham Park.

The Parham Park Trust was unavailable for comment.