This morning was the first 2012 Sunday session of Transition Town Wandsworth's Community Garden. We had lots of jobs to do and 5 energetic volunteers so we got cracking with our spades and gardening tools.
We had a lovely mild day to work in.
We had several jobs to do:1. We have a mound of compost and either need to contain it or use it up rather quickly. As our community garden is located within a public park we need to make our compost heap look more beautiful. However, we have the dilemma of not being able to build a structure against the wall to contain it in a wooden structure and are not sure how to deal with it. Gardening generates waste plant material and it would be great to be able to turn it into usable material for the garden.
So in the meantime, we buried the partly composted material from the compost heap into trenches where the soil is not so rich and fertile. Any ideas on a remedy for this?
2. We had a separate mound of fully composted material kindly donated by the Council so we distributed it as top soil for the raised beds.
3. We removed leaves from the base of plants to try to prevent botrytis on the lower leaves of plants. Botrytis is a fungal condition which occurs in damp environments and is commonly found on strawberry plants. The fallen leaves bunched up at the base of perennials and keeping in moisture is prime breeding ground for this condition.
With 5 volunteers we were able to make a good stab at the jobs but weren't able to complete them all so will have to finish them off in next Sunday's session.
We need more to come and join us, its great fun and the more the merrier! Bramford Community Garden is a big site in Wandsworth's Bramford Park. If you want to join us - please get in touch! Email: ttwandsworth@hotmail.co.uk
For more information:
Bramford Community Garden Project Dirt
Transition Town Wandsworth
Obviously hard work must be rewarded so we shared out the harvested veg :) Not bad going for January!
Off to warm up in a nearby cafe with a well deserved hot chocolate.
Hi Claire - Great to connect with you. I am active in Marsden and Slaithwaite Transition Town - we were quite an early TT and we are in the new TT Film which we'll be premiereing here in Feb.... v.exciting. Regarding compost - have you thought of investing in (or making) a compost tumbler .... you'd probably be better to make one given the public nature of your site. Makes compost really quickly.... or a wormery? Why doesn't the council want compost on the site - I would've thought it's essential to display how a proper organic garden works, anyhow, I'm sure you'll've been round the houses on this one ;-)
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