Points of interest

We are excited to share our vision for a thriving 600 square meter market garden, designed using the no-dig method. Currently, the area is tarped over to naturally mulch the existing grass, preparing the ground for an organic transformation. Next year, we will cover the area with rich compost and use woodchips to form pathways, creating a fertile and sustainable growing environment.

Our market garden will feature 60 beds, each 0.75m wide and 10m long. Here’s a glimpse into our diverse planting strategy:

Herbs Section:
Each row dedicated to herbs will include a rotation of garlic, lettuce, onion, and radish.
Companion planting with flowers and broad beans ensures a healthy ecosystem.

Current and Berry Sections:
These rows will be dedicated to garlic, chard, and lettuces.
We will also grow a variety of berries, sweetcorn, beets, and garlic.

Main Crop Sections:
Rows will feature robust vegetables such as brassicas, sprouting broccoli, courgettes, cabbages, and broccoli.
Companion planting with onions and flowers will promote pest control and enhance plant health.

Pathways:
Pathways will be formed using woodchips, facilitating easy access and maintaining soil structure.

Crop Rotation and Companion Planting:
Our garden plan includes strategic crop rotation and companion planting to maintain soil health, reduce pests, and maximise yields.
We will rotate crops like brassicas, courgettes, and potatoes to prevent soil depletion and ensure balanced nutrition.

Sustainable Practices:
No-dig gardening enhances soil health by preserving its natural structure and beneficial organisms.
Composting enriches the soil with organic matter, promoting robust plant growth.
Woodchip pathways prevent soil compaction and maintain moisture levels.


Our market garden will be a vibrant, productive space, supporting both our community and the environment. Stay tuned as we transform this area into a bountiful haven for fresh, organic produce. We look forward to sharing our progress and harvests with you!

In the winter of 2024, we received ten apple trees as part of Thatcher’s Community Orchard Project. The project shares their passion for apple trees, building communities and constant effort in supporting the environment and ecosystem around us today and for the future.

Amongst the ten trees, we have five different varieties of apples, each with their own special purpose:

• Bramley – one of the best loved apples for home cooking.
• Cox – this popular eating apple has a sweet aromatic flavour, and it makes a superb single variety cider.
• Katy - a juicy, red skinned eating apple. Thatcher’s use it for their Katy Single Variety cider.
• Scrumptious – this beautiful bright red skinned eating apple has a complexity of flavours.
• Red Windsor – a deep red eating apple oozing with superb flavour.

Traditional orchards can be a haven for wildlife and an important contributor to the local ecosystem.

Because orchards are mosaics of trees, grasses, shrubs and wildflowers, they support a wide range of wildlife. As fruit trees age quickly, they create the perfect habitats for invertebrates and birds, such as the lesser spotted woodpecker and the rare noble chafer beetle. Orchards also lend themselves to certain mosses, as well as plants like mistletoe.

Nestled within our site, the orchard will not only provide a source of delicious and diverse apple varieties, but also be used as an educational tool to promote orchard care, apple processing and traditional cider-making techniques.

Born and bred in the south west, we’d love to hold our own annual Wassail, a celebration traditionally done to bless orchards to ensure a good harvest. A procession to the orchard, announcement of the Wassail king or queen, folk singing, cider drinking, morris dancing and general merriment sounds a great way to connect the local community with rural tradition and promote small-scale farming!

We’ll get the local community involved in the planting and maintenance of the trees and will share our harvest; pressing the apples to make cider, apple juice and apple cider vinegar. We can dry excess apples, preserving them to enjoy during the hungry gap, and use the waste from apple pressing to add to compost.

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The Bradley Brook runs along the northern perimeter of the site and acts as a ‘blue corridor’ to connect our site with Three Brooks LNR, Bradley Brook LNR and Monk’s Pool LNR.

We have been clearing Himalayan balsam from the riverbank, an invasive non-native plant that is listed on Schedule 9 of the Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981. Himalayan balsam shades out other vegetation, gradually impoverishing habitats by killing off other plants. As an annual plant, Himalayan balsam dies back in the winter and, where the plant grows in river systems, can leave river banks bare of vegetation and liable to erosion. Each plant can produce up to 800 seeds. These are dispersed widely as the ripe seedpods shoot their seeds up to 7m away.

We are planning to make and deploy eel rope, an effective method to help critically endangered European eels over river barriers such as weirs and small dams. We will deploy the rope before April, ahead of active upstream migration.

https://environment.data.gov.uk/catchment-planning/WaterBody/GB109053027570

On 6th May 2024, ecologists Charlie Gardiner and Daisy Huxter set up a static bat detector (Bat Logger) on the farm, in the hopes of gaining a better understanding of how bats are using the site and which species are present.

After Charlie analysed the data using a piece of software called BatExplorer, he found some interesting results. In just one night, there were a total of 437 passes of bats. Of these 437 passes, 122 of them were Daubenton's bat, 311 were common pipistrelle, 2 were noctule and 2 were serotine. 

The passes were fairly restricted to around 45 minutes after sunset and about one hour before sunrise. This could potentially indicate that a roost is nearby. The detector was placed next to some large mature oak trees on the southern boundary which had some good roosting features, including woodpecker holes, making it very likely that bats are roosting in these trees. 

The Daubenton’s bat is frequently associated with water so they are likely using the brook for feeding and commuting to the nearby nature reserves along the brook before returning to roost later on.

These findings are really insightful and we plan to complete even more bat surveys to get a better understanding of how the site as a whole is being used by these incredible flying mammals.

We began planting our coppice in the winter of 2023/2024.

We received 420 trees from the Woodland Trust through their Free Trees for Schools and Communities grant.

The species you can find within the coppice are as follows:
• Hazel
• Rowan
• Sessile oak
• Goat willow
• Grey willow
• Holly
• Downy birch
• Silver birch
• Wild cherry
• Field maple

We also planted 600 osier willow. This species of willow is excellent for basket making and weaving because of its strength and ability to bend. It’s also a source of food and shelter for native wildlife and can even be used to decontaminate the soil. Osier willow has the ability to absorb heavy metals, and is often planted to 'clean up' contaminated waste ground.

Coppicing is a traditional method of woodland management. Coppicing is the practice of cutting trees and shrubs to ground level, promoting vigorous re-growth and a sustainable supply of timber for future generations. After 8-15 years, these are then harvested, restarting the cycle once more. This can help to prevent the manifestation of dead or diseased wood in the tree, by renewing constant fresh growth and the removal of old wood, allowing the tree to live for a lot longer than if it were left un-coppiced.

We will use the timber harvested on site for pea sticks, bean poles, fencing, firewood and green woodworking.

Our solar power setup reduces our carbon footprint and is a great example of how small-scale solar generation can help us live more sustainably. It seems like magic to be able harness the power of the sun to power our activities in the office/classroom, with easily accessible components.

The diagram below illustrates our basic solar power setup designed to supply electricity to the office. The system includes four 120-watt solar panels connected to a charge controller, which regulates the energy flow to a 24V 200Ah battery. From the charge controller, power is distributed to both AC and DC circuits. The DC to AC inverter converts the stored DC power to AC, which is then directed to a mains fuse board that supplies electricity to lights and sockets within the office. Simultaneously, the charge controller feeds a 12V fuse board, powering USB ports, a CCTV system, and a 4G WiFi router. This configuration ensures that both AC and DC devices can be powered efficiently using solar energy, providing a reliable and sustainable energy solution for the office.

For anyone interested in setting up a reliable off-grid solar power system, "Off-grid Solar Power Simplified: RVs, Vans, Cabins, Boats and Tiny Homes" by Nick Seghers is an essential read. This book provides clear and concise guidance tailored for various off-grid applications. We highly recommend it for anyone looking to learn more about harnessing the power of the sun for sustainable living, there is a copy in the office if you fancy having a flick through, just ask one of the Green Team.

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After clearing an investigative path through the scrub in February 2024, it was revealed that there is a pond in the west of the Site, along the boundary of the top field. The pond was unknown to the previous landowner and was observed by the Got Greens Team on OS online maps.

Historically ponds on farmland were an important resource, used to water livestock and crops. These man-made ponds were known as dew ponds, sometimes called cloud ponds or mist ponds. They were created in the 18th and 19th centuries and for almost 200 years, farmers relied on these ponds to provide water for farm animals, so the ponds were regularly maintained as an essential part of the farm (YWT, 2023).

However, in the 20th century, farming practices changed. Importantly, farms could for the first time have water piped directly to them. Farmers started to use more machinery, and stopped keeping as many animals. All of this meant that over time, the need for dew ponds decreased and many were lost over time.

Conservative estimates of pond loss suggest that almost 50% of farm ponds have been lost in the UK in the last 50 years, leading to a loss of diversity and abundance of invertebrates, animals and plants (WWT, 2023).

The pond on site is currently full of dead organic matter with no aquatic vegetation growing. The pond is surrounded by dense scrub (hawthorn and bramble), preventing light from getting to the pond. We plan to begin clearing the pond in the autumn after the bird nesting season ends, by removing much of the scrub and clearing out the sludge at the bottom of the pond. We will try to reshape the pond in the hopes of helping it to retain water through the spring and summer months.


Reference List:

WWT (2023) Restoring lost farmland ponds. Accessed 8/3/24: https://www.wwt.org.uk/our-work/projects/restoring-lost-farmland-ponds/

Yorkshire Wildlife Trust (2023) Restoring and managing dew ponds. Accessed 8/3/24: https://www.ywt.org.uk/wolds-dew-ponds/restoration

Wildflower area

We prepared this area in the summer of 2022 by removing the top layer of turf. This reduces competition from more vigorously growing grasses like cocksfoot. It also helps to reduce the fertility of the soil, which many wildflowers favour.

In the autumn of 2022 we raked the area to produce a medium tilth and sowed wildflower seeds. Seeds grown this time of year tend to flower earlier in the spring, using the winter frost to kick-start their germination. This helps to aid pollinators as they come out of hibernation, by providing more nectar sources.

We used a wildflower and grass seed mix suited to heavier soils, from Emorsgate Seeds.
The complete mix was composed of 20% native wildflowers and 80% slow growing grasses.

Flowers:
Yarrow
Agrimony
Betony
Common Knapweed
Lady’s Bedstraw
Meadow Crane’s-bill
Meadow Vetchling
Rough Hawkbit
Oxeye Daisy
Bird’s-foot Trefoil
Musk Mallow
Black Medick
Ribwort Plantain
Cowslip
Selfheal
Meadow Buttercup
Great Burnet
Pepper-saxifrage
Ragged Robin
Tufted Vetch

Grasses:
Common Bent
Sweet Vernal-grass
Quaking Grass
Crested Dogstail
Red Fescue
Meadow Foxtail
Meadow Fescue

We do not cut this not cut this area from spring through to late July/August to give the sown species an opportunity to flower. After flowering in July or August we take a ‘hay cut’, where we cut back with a scythe, petrol strimmer or mower to ~50mm. We then leave the ‘hay’ to dry and shed seed for 1-7 days then remove the arisings.

Perennial herbs, with their ability to provide a continuous harvest year after year, embody permaculture principles by promoting resilience, reducing soil disturbance, and fostering a self-sustaining ecosystem.

With perennials, the above-ground portion of the plant dies back in freezing weather, but re-grows from the base and rootstock the following spring to bloom again.

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