Land and Food Forum success!!

A massive thanks to everyone that took part in this hugely inspirational day. We had key speakers from policy campaigners and strategy thinkers to growers and diverse community projects. Over 350 turned out for a very sunny day. Through a series of facilitated workshops people were able to network and bring fresh ideas to solving the issue of creating a sustainable food system.

For Avon Wildlife Trust this is very important as the Urban Pollinators project is showing remarkable trends that show allotments to host a higher abundance of pollinator insects than a large range of other landscapes. This includes habitats in rural areas.  Avon Wildlife Trust is trying to find solution to link up the living landscape and this forum helped empower a range of active community projects.

Additionally on the day we pressed a huge quantity of apples from the site, enjoyed food fresh from the site cooked by the Market Kitchen and had kids getting involved in Pumpkin Mania.

Thanks again to all involved. Keep an eye out for next seasons events on the blog calender.

Land and Food Forum Event Oct 5th

Feed Bristol is hosting a Land Matters Forum. Come along and join the conversation. Lots of inspiring key speakers from different areas of food production, land rights, local food policy and food sovereignty. This is a day of inspiration targeted at those that are intend on developing a society that can support its own food needs.

Free event between 11-4

Hot food from the plot for lunch

Key speakers from:
Campaign for Rural England
Land Workers Alliance
Bristol Food Policy Council
Reclaim the Field
Food Land and Sustaination
Other project presenting ideas: Simms Hill, Feed Bristol, Edible Future

Kids activities as part of pumpkin mania
Plus apple pressing

If you want to be part of the day please send us an email. All cake donation gratefully received.

Wildlife & Harvest Festival

Welcome one and all to what is set to be an amazing Feed Bristol event!

We're bringing in the harvest to feast on the fruits of our labours; this is the time of year when we really do 'Feed Bristol'. We've got bags of stuff going on with fun nature activities for kids, wildlife workshops for adults and hands-on harvesting! 

There will be a veritable feast of vegetables of all shapes and sizes to enjoy as well as live music, beautiful craft stalls and as always a wonderful selection teas and cake.

We do hope you'll join us for one of the biggest events in the Feed Bristol calendar.
Please click the poster below for more info:

Storing and Preserving Workshop

We're gearing up to another wonderful open day at Feed Bristol, this time we're offering the chance to try your hand at pickling and preserving.

We have two chefs on hand so whether you've been doing this for years and want to compare methods or have never been quite sure where to start, come along to see a cooking demonstration, ask questions and taste some of the final result! 

Taking place on Saturday 3rd of August, 11am-4pm at Feed Bristol.
Click the poster below for more info:

Beekeeping Workshop

We're getting busy with the bees on Saturday 6th July!
This free event provides everything you ever wanted to know about beekeeping through a hands-on workshop.  Find out the essentials of bee care using tried and tested organic best practice.

We would appreciate you letting us know you're attending by emailing feedbristol@avonwildlifetrust.org.uk so we can confirm numbers. 

Click the poster below for more info:

Roundhouse

Up she rises! Shift Bristol are cracking on with building the roundhouse. The chestnut has come from a local nature reserve that needed thinning. the next stage is putting up the straw bale walls which will be clay/cob plastered with a lime wash finish. They sit on a ring of recycled tires which have compacted recycled road scalpings in them. The roof will be a made of turf with wild meadow seed sown in.  England has lost 97% of wildflower meadows since world war 2.

The roundhouse will be part of our bigger wild flower butterfly meadow. Avon Wildlife Trust is committed to conserving and enhancing these meadows as hundreds of species of insect rely on specific set of wild flowers.

This Saturday (22nd June) we are once again open 11am-4pm for people to explore the site, find out about who we are and get involved in the digging!  Scott will be running a workshop/workday on a Forest Garden, so if you'd like to find out more come and get your hands dirty this Saturday!

More info here:

https://www.facebook.com/events/667621246587281/

like us on Facebook

Find our facebook page to see more photos of the site in development and like it to stay intouch.

New wildlife pond

Thanks to the help of the prince's trust who completed a two week community project we completed our wildlife pond and got the rescue tadpoles in just in time.

Round house begins!

We have finally started building our round house. This will be a fantastic new asset to the site demonstrating sustainable building techniques and creating great habitats for local wildlife. the walls will be made from chestnut poles, with straw bale and cob wood walls, on top we will have a wild flower meadow as the roof. Come and check it out at the Get Growing trail on the 8th and 9th of June.

George Ferguson visit to Feed Bristol

Had an absolutely stonking day of success showing George Ferguson and his team around feed Bristol today. George is the independent candidate that got voted in by the people of Bristol. He is a huge supporter of local food initiatives so it was great to finally get him to the project to show him what amazing things have been happening here.

We had a really busy day with a group in from Chandos House drugs rehab, a youth group from Princes Trust finishing their wildlife pond challenge, people in from milestone who support learning difficulties, the local community came along from all ages from prams to walking sticks, the Blue Finger Alliance were in to offer George a pot of valuable grade 1 agricultural soil that we grow our veg on.
It was a blazing day showing off the project to it full glory. See the post before this for the next event on 8^th June – the get growing trail. And come see for yourself what we are so happy about showing everyone today.

Get Growing Trail 8-9 June 2013

This will be our first year anniversary! We want to celebrate in style by showing you what our project is all about. You will be taken on a journey through the site with workshops along the way, live music to set the scene and an informative local food forum to drop into. To set it all off we will have the Herbal and delicious cafe selling delights and freshly picked herbal teas from our plots.

There will be a chef doing cooking demonstrations and and a big BBQ banquet from the site. Kids activities, arts and craft. Plenty to keep you all amused and entertained.

May day celebration

Fantastic thanks to everyone involved in helping us celebrate the beginning of summer. We sung and danced with the Rag Morris and around the May pole. Summer has come at last and Feed Bristol is alive once again with the sound of birds chirping and vegetables heaving up out of the soil.

Keep an eye out for our next event - the get growing trail as more celebration to come. Amazingly it was only last year that we opened to the public for the first time!

You are warmly invited to another FREE fun packed day at Feed Bristol Come join us dancing round the May pole with the Morris Dancers! We will be holding the traditional ceremony of crowning the May Queen so we encourage all girls and ladies to dress to in their Spring Best to try and win the crown! There will a talk from Green Peace highlighting the advantages of eating local food PLUS stalls, live music and our fantastic cafe selling a range of teas and delicious cakes. It's a great opportunity to have a look at our beautiful site and we hope to see as many of you there as possible.

This Saturday is set to be yet another fun-filled Feed Bristol Event! 

We'll be hunting out Easter Eggs and making Scarecrows in the beautiful sunshine (fingers crossed!)

We'd love to see you there, whether you're new to Feed Bristol or have been many times before this is a great opportunity to come and find out more about the project whilst having jolly good time.

Bristol Seed Swap SPRINGS into action

Thanks to everyone for a massive effort to make this such a success – especially to Belinda and her team from Bristol Seed Swap (see their Facebook page to get involved with their events). If anyone wants to support Feed Bristol with our future events or use the site to host your own event, contact us on: feedbristol@avonwildlifetrust.org.uk

Around 400 people descended on Feed Bristol to swap seeds and tales of adventure in the garden. There was a big emphases on making a connection with the living landscape around us. The day kick started with a walk and talk up the valley to Simms Hill, where the inspiring Patrick Whitefield explored the heritage and immense potential this unique living landscape we live in offers.

A big thanks to 'The Blue Finger Alliance' who hosted an all day running forum on the importance of protecting the precious high grade soil which runs up the valley that Feed Bristol sits on and linking up key thinking on how Bristol can secure local food production for the future. As part of this campaign we will be bringing this issue to George Ferguson. To find out how to get involved, support the group or send a postcard to George - see our website: www.bluefingeralliance.org.uk

There was a whole host of other successful talks and workshops including Mike Feingold and the Bristol Pound. We had a workshop to raise our new wooden A-frame bodgers shelter which popped up just in time for the rain and the bands to start playing. Thanks to Rypelwood Workers Coop for supplying locally sourced materials and highly skilled green woodworkers (www.rypelwood.co.uk).

Finally, hopefully see you all for our next event on the 6^th April for a festive Easter potato hunt. Find you spud and cook it on our fire. Lots of other healthy fun activities to follow including scarecrow making – see our events calendar on the other tab on this blog.

                                         In the poly tunnel where all good things begin!

                                          Putting the bits together.

 

                                         Thanks to Ushti Baba

 

 

 

 

Bristol Seed Swap and the Big Dig 16th March

On the 16th March (11-4) Feed Bristol is hosting the annual Bristol Seed Swap in conjunction with the Big Dig.

For further information on the Bristol 2013 Seed Swap, contact :

Email: bristolseedswap@gmail.com

See their Facebook page: www.facebook.com/bristol.seedswap

 

For further info on Sustains Big Dig see: www.bigdig.org.uk

The Seed Swap is fun-filled family event and is open to anyone interested in seeds, food growing and organic gardening. A fantastic opportunity to pick up or swap a diverse selection of seeds including unusual and tasty varieties, meet some fellow gardeners and exchange growing tips, experiences and resources. 

At the same time the event offers a chance to participate in building and strengthening local food security, reclaiming seed sovereignty, supporting organic practises, developing local connections and sharing local knowledge and skills. 

If you’re up for learning, discussing and sharing ideas, there will be a range of talks focusing on various earthly and food growing issues. There will also be fun activities for kids, a range of stalls with information about local growing and environmental groups, plants, fruit trees, local produce and local craftwork.

All served with a large helping of deliciously fruity live music, freshly prepared cakes, a hearty soup and your finest teas and healthy juices!

If you have surplus seeds to share / swap; please bring them along in a labelled envelope or other container. A large selection of seeds have also been very kindly donated by Chiltern Seeds, Edwin Tucker and Thompson Morgan. 

The Bristol 2013 Seed Swap Event offers a great opportunity to visit and support these pioneering food growing initiatives located on the infamous and endangered Blue Finger in Stapleton, some of the most fertile land in the country, listed as grade 1 agricultural land. A beautiful green field site, buzzing with wildlife and a hive of community food growing activity.  As part of The Big Dig both Feed Bristol and Simms Hill CSA will also be putting on a range of engaging food growing and land based activities. See their websites for further details. One for the diary! 

The Big Dig is a nationwide campaign to get people out to support their local community projects. We will be running site tours between Feed Bristol and Simms Hill. For more information and other projects taking part check their website: www.bigdig.org.uk

 

 

Many thanks

Belinda Faullkes

Forest School

Some of the first activities on site have been our Forest School group who braved the cold and enjoyed getting thouroughly muddy.

Pruning and Grafting workshop

Thanks to Tim Foster we had a very productive day pruning and restoring our mature apple trees. They have been overgrown with thick ivy for year but they have been reinvigorated. The day was about learning and sharing new skills as well as doing some work on the site.

We are managing the rest of the overgrown trees by leaving them to nature. One large apple tree is wrapped in ivy with lots of dead wood in it. This leaves lots of places for bats to roost. The ivy provides lots of different species of birds, insects and bees a source of food from the flowers.

We had a very healthy lunch of seasonal salads, carrots and radishes. The poly tunnel is still very productive with even the lettuce producing well.

In the afternoon we got to work grafting a range of different varieties of apple scions to root stock. The aim is to build up a nursery  area to bring on fruit trees to support the project and other community groups.

Blue Finger Alliance video

If you are interested in why our land had such a productive year, have a look at the short film made by the Blue Finger Alliance. This is a group set up to promote the value of a fantastic natural asset that Bristol has. The Blue Finger is a strip of land running along the M32 corridor, of high grade agricultural soil which Feed Bristol sits on. It is also a strategic green corridor for wildlife and nature.

Link to film which features Feed Bristol:

http://www.bluefingeralliance.org.uk/

Wassail (Photos)

Well I think we definitely managed to warm up the summer spirits and get them to think about coming back for another year of growing at Feed Bristol. They certainly blessed us with some sunshine for the the day.

Many thanks to Poko Drum for entertaining the kids, the Pigsty Morris for showing us all how to have a jolly good knees up, the absolutely fabulous newly formed Feed Bristol Mummers and of course Mr Medlers Micro Ceilidh for keeping the blood flowing to round us off at the end.  And to the many other people who helped the event along feeding us cake, hot stew, stoking the fires and sprinkling magic on the day. Thank you.

A few photos of our play, Robin of the Apple Hood.
Performed to resurrect our crops where they once stood.
Enjoyed by many and all,
Amongst the trees of Feed Bristol.

Wassail Wassail all over the town

We are celebrating with a traditional Wassail on Saturday 26th January to kick of the new growing season.
The home made cider is ready, we have written a Mummers play and hopefully we will be having a right old knees up with a Mr Medlers Ceilidh.

All for a good cause to scare of the old winter spirits and welcome in the fresh new summer spirits to ensure another great harvest.  Although we try our best with organic practise and encourage all the wildlife to work for us, sometimes a little sprinkle of magic can help the growing along.

Feed Bristol Film

During the fantastic year we had last year we decided to make a short film to review some of the work we had been doing. Follow the link below to check out the project. Thanks to everyone that took part. This just shows a snippet of what we have been doing with a few of the folk we work with. Amongst all the food growing we also explore the local nature and help develop ways to encourage wildlife.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UQK8GBYCsis