Winter Pollinator Party
For hardy walkers, the day started with a guided nature walk around the village led by Helena Crouch.
For everyone else, it started with making seed cakes for birds. Intended originally for children, this didn’t stop adults getting involved, mashing lard and seeds together inside paper cups that were taken home to hang up in gardens. Verdict: messy but fun!
On offer too was a mammoth seed swap. Thanks to WECA and Somer Valley Rediscovered, we were able to give away masses of packets of wildflower seeds which, typically, can be eye-wateringly expensive. In addition, lots of visitors brought their own seeds to swap: flowers, vegetable and even garlic bulbs. We have loads of seeds left over, so if you missed this, there will be another chance for seeds and swaps at our spring event on April 28.
Gary Johnstone gave a terrific cooking demonstration, using his homegrown Jerusalem artichokes to make a terrific soup. Most people came back for seconds, together with crusty French bread, generously donated by the Co-op. The generosity of people was really what made this event so fantastic.
Gary’s recipe is below. He said that, if you don’t have (or like) artichokes, you can substitute pretty much any vegetable—leeks, carrots, broccoli. Butter beans are the magic ingredient.
After lunch, Jon Wheatley gave a talk about a scheme run by the Royal Horticultural Society called
It’s Your Neighbourhood
This is a non-competitive scheme aimed at helping communities beautify parts of their village and to increase biodiversity. Jon, who is the Chair of Britain in Bloom South West and Vice President of the RHS, explained how the scheme works.
We identify public areas in the village which offer opportunities for new planting and include these in our application to join. We get a mentor who will come and review the sites, providing advice and guidance. Every year, each village is visited and assessed and more advice given. The idea is that, over time, the scheme draws in more community supporters and participants as more and more planting sites thrive.
Jon has kindly offered to be our mentor – he lives in Chew Magna – and Sara Price will be organizing a small group meeting to meet with Jon, review possible areas for planting, and figure out the next steps.
If you’d like to get involved in the Farrington Gurney It’s Your Neighbourhood project, please email us putting RHS in the subject line.
Thanks Jon and Sara for making this happen!
Plants! Plants! Plants!
Many of you will remember from the July pollinator party that we had a splendid plant giveaway. The plants were funded by WECA’s Bee Pollinator Fund but we were able to provide so many gorgeous plants because we bought them through a wholesaler, which made the money go very much further.
Margaret Heffernan proposed a Group Purchasing Scheme for the village which would work like this:
· We send out a list of pollinator-supporting plants that should flourish in our soil and climate. You choose as many of these as you want.
· Payment terms: 50% on ordering, 50% on collection.
· The plants are delivered to a central location in Farrington Gurney, where they are paid for and collected.
The advantages: cheaper plants, happier pollinators and fewer car journeys to get them.
If you are interested in taking part and did not sign up at the February event, please email here putting PLANTS in the subject line. A plant list will be circulated in April.
Community Fridge
Ross Perkins then introduced a proposal for a Community Fridge in Farrington Gurney.
Community Fridges are NOT food banks.
They are intended to tackle the huge problem of food waste. Just as an illustration: Just over the Christmas period in Britain, 441 million pounds of food was thrown out. A community fridge is stocked with excess food donated by supermarkets and food shops, as well as food from residents who may not be able to use it because they are going on holiday or when they have a glut from veg patches and allotments. Everyone can contribute and everyone can take from the fridge; doing so helps elimate waste from the food chain.
Ross’s talk was brilliantly supported by
Who described how their Community Fridge in Shepton Mallet got up and running and how it’s maintained. It takes food donated from 13 different shops. The fridge is opened, stocked, tidied and shut each day by volunteers. And everyone uses it! Why not? Croissants, eggs, bread, cheese: it’s all good fresh stuff and it’s free.
To get our Community Fridge started, we will need the fridge, a shed in which it can be locked up, an accessible safe location and volunteers to run it. The project is already off to a great start. Our local Councillor, Ann Morgan, has a small pot of money she can use for her constituents and she has agreed to contribute £500 for the year 2023 and another £500 for 2024. That should be enough to buy the fridge. The Duchy of Cornwall has agreed to contribute to the costs of the shed, which still needs calculating; the Men’s Shed has agreed to build it. Incredible isn’t it?
Huge shout out to Ross, to Patricia, and to Roxie (the carrot!) for their generous advice, help and encouragement. We couldn’t do it without you!
Thanks and Future Events
The day concluded with another brave band of nature walkers, more seed cakes, seed swaps, teas and coffees – big thanks to Mark and Ross at the hatch – and a fair amount of cleaning up.
Since then, if you think you see a lot more daffodils and tulips in the village than you’ve seen before, you aren’t dreaming. These were planted by the Farrington Green team, once again using WECA money from the Bee Pollinator fund.
Thanks WECA!
The Spring Pollinator Party will focus on the topic of REPAIR: how to fix and mend things so that we don’t have to throw them away and buy more. This will include
· The Fixy Van: This is a team supported by Somerset Council who have bravely volunteered to cross the county border with their van, from which they take unwanted digital technology. The team will wipe and refurbish or recyle all smart digital devices. So if you have any of that stuff lying around - old cameras, watches, hard drives, routers, PCs, tablets, phones - they will refurbish them if they can, and donate to schools, or recycle every bit of them. NOTHING GOES TO LANDFILL! So start collecting any of these today and bring them to the Memorial Hall in April. (Please note: they do NOT take monitors.)
· High Littleton Repair Café are also sending volunteers. The café mends electrical devices so please feel free to bring those along for their attention!
· Sewing: It turns out we have quite a lot of sewing machines in the village and they will be working with kids and adults to patch clothing that is a bit worn but doesn’t need to be thrown away. Patching material, together with fabric pens if you want to decorate your patches, will be available on the day. So bring along those comfy clothes you want to save for another year or two.
· By public demand, George Chan will be back with another talk, this time talking about the connection between pollinators and climate change.
· There will be another talk on what this means for gardeners; what kinds of planting can make a difference?
· Avon Wildlife Trust’s Amie Cook will be talking about local wildlife.
· The seed swap will return. Because not everyone has seeds to swap, this time we’d like everyone to benefit—so please help yourself to seeds and leave a donation if you don’t have seeds to contribute.
· Bug boxes will be back! We have some kits left over from July—so get there early!
· Please bring excess seedlings if you want to give them away or sell them.
· Helena Crouch will be leading another nature walk, this time to Chewton Wood. It will be a bit longer than the previous walks—so let’s hope for a nice dry day!
SAVE THE DATE: APRIL 28TH AT THE MEMORIAL HALL
