Following a recent visit from Jim and Wendy Henderson, GFAA has received our It’s Your Neighbourhood assessment report for 2022. We are pleased to report we have retained our Outstanding rating. These are extracts from the final report.
Tag: News Page 7 of 52
We took delivery of our Wheelchair-friendly Picnic Table this Tuesday.
We weren’t expecting it to come flat-packed and the team’s first attempt to assemble it lead to consternation amongst the volunteers and cries of, “Should have gone to IKEA.”
However, the team soon rose to the occasion and had it all sorted out.
The table and bench set is entirely made from recycled plastics and is designed to facilitate use by two wheelchair users and and group of six. It will certainly be a great community asset for many years to come.
Representatives of Aberdeen City’s six Green Flag sites today attended an event to celebrate The Duthie Park being awarded with their tenth annual Green Flag Award. Yes, they have achieved Ten in a Row.
Garthdee Field’s third annual inspection visit is scheduled for Tuesday August 16 at 9.30 in the morning. Please put this date in your diaries if you will be able to come along. The Judges very much look forward to chatting with plotters, friends and volunteers during their visits. They will want to know and see:
- How welcoming our site is
- How well maintained it is
- How we encourage biodiversity and green gardening
- How sustainable our approaches and practices are.
Of course, we hope to have our site in the best possible shape for the visit to ensure we retain our Green Flag status and recognition as a well run public green space. All help to tidy up on and around plots will be much appreciated. If you would like to help on the communal areas please see a member of the Committee for suggestions.
It will be bonfire day again very soon. Make sure you don’t miss the big burn. Drop off your unwanted timber and brush this week. No plastics, carpets, netting or the like please – wood only.
Storm Arwen has brought more damage to our site than most of us can ever remember.
Certainly, others have suffered and are still suffering much great losses and inconvenience and our thoughts are with them, but you can’t help but feel that some of our plotters have been very unlucky.
It’s a real pleasure to review this title from a local Aberdeen author, Alan Carter. Alan is a plotter here in Aberdeen and this is (I believe) his first published book.
A few years ago (2018) I attended a Forest Gardening course Alan hosted on his allotment. It was a hugely enjoyable day, but a challenging one. I was a traditional plotter and the Forest Gardening approach undermined most of the ideas I had about growing vegetables.
I came away from the course keen to try out the methods I had seen, but since then I have struggled to make them work for me. I needed a “roadmap”: Alan’s new book will provide just that.
Spoiler alert: I think, “A Food Forest for your Garden” is an exceptional book. I am not alone: the book has attracted a bevy of admirers from within the community of food forest and permaculture growers. Alan has lived, breathed, trialled and adapted these methods for years and this shines through in his writing. The book is part bible, part manual and part memoir with all the authenticity and authority you could ask for. Oh, and with a rich dollop of humour thrown in for good measure.
I only have one reservation about the book – and that is its using the phrase “Food Forest” in the title. It may confuse some and put others off. Don’t be put off by it. Alan does a great job of explaining where it comes from, what its history is and how it works for gardeners. Everybody who has enjoyed lifting a shaw of tatties, or lamented the failure of their parsnips will enjoy reading this book and learn from it.
So what does it offer us plotters? These are the take-aways that stand out for me.
- It will take your no-dig gardening practice and understanding to whole new heights. Conserving soil structure lies at the core of forest gardening.
- If you are interested in adding more perennial veggies into your beds you could not find better advice. Alan lists a directory of hundreds of edible plants chosen because they are suitable for growing in Scotland.
- It will help you extend the growing season beyond the short Scottish Summer and show new possibilities all year round.
- You will be freed from the chore of endless weeding and trying to keep black earth black and weed-free. In the established forest garden annual weeds can’t find much a foothold.
- There is money to be saved too through saving seeds and encouraging volunteer plants.
- Alan provides a kitchen’s worth of personal recipes and advice on how to get the best out of each harvest.
Look on the book as an encyclopedia of how to design, create and manage your new garden. It is also lavishly illustrated with excellent photos, many taken by Alan on his own plot.
So, what’s not to like? Nothing. Do yourself a favour and ask Santa to pop a copy into your Christmas Stocking. It will make for a delightful dip-in read over the Christmas hols, then take its place on your shelves for years to come as a much used reference book.
Copies are available via Alan’s Own Website
Or from Amazon via this link.
Or for all good bookshops: Published by Permanent Publications in 2021 with IBSN 1856232999.