OPERATION Covert is to receive its largest single donation yet following the unprecedented success of a gardens open day by Kidderminster Horticultural Society.

The green-fingered group, which is the largest of its kind in Worcestershire, generated a staggering £4,000 for the Shuttle/Times and News campaign to rebuild the Rhydd Covert Scout centre, when it opened 10 gardens and three allotments to the public on Sunday. The cash - made by charging admission, receiving donations, as well as holding a raffle and tea and cake sale - will take the fund past the £28,000 mark.

Before this, the largest single donation had been the £3,098 collected at the funeral of former guide, Suzanne Smith, from Hawkbatch, near Bewdley, who died in a car accident last year.

Garden day organiser, Sue Cooke, said she was "gob-smacked" by the success of the event, which attracted between 250 and 300 people, including 18 gardeners from Kidderminster's twin town of Husum.

She explained the largest amount previously raised by the club's annual fund-raiser had been £2,700 for Kidderminster Hospital.

"I really couldn't believe that we'd made that much money but I was thrilled to bits," she said of the moment she discovered the total raised.

She added the raffle alone, which had prizes including a weekend away in a Ramada hotel anywhere in the country, Sunday lunch at La Brasserie in Kidderminster and a 3ft tree fern, had coined in more than £1,400 and the glorious weather - which followed a rainy Friday and Saturday - had helped draw in the crowds.

Shuttle/Times & News editor, Clive Joyce, said: "The fantastic amount of money raised is a tribute to the standards set by the Kidderminster society's gardeners.

"Obviously, visitors would not part with their money if they had not been impressed by what they saw."

He added: "The society's members have supported many worthy causes over the years and we are grateful to them for backing the Scouts on this occasion."