Posted: July 28, 2014

Had a lovely day at the garden. A few new faces and plenty of regulars. We weeded, watered, cleared the bolted greens (lettuce and chard), and planted pak choi and chard. The harvest was potatoes, tomatoes, chard, lettuce, squash, runner beans and radishes. Digging the potatoes was seriously hard work as the dry soil was like concrete – thanks to Prakash for his persistence. Sadie made harvest piles and we had to draw straws as there weren’t enough squash to go around.

Save the date – Saturday 20 September is the tentative date for the Harvest Feast. It’s Capital Growth’s Edible Garden Open Day. Here’s an image of last year’s harvest feast:

Harvest Feast 2013

Everything is really early this year because of the warm weather. The crab apples are at least a month early. We harvested some of those as well to make delicious jelly – recipe here.

Billy watering the roots of the tomatoes

The harvest

Lynn weeding.

Prakash digging potatoes.

Runner beans on their amazing support built by the Trees for Cities trainees.

Posted: July 21, 2014

This week we welcomed a couple more new gardeners to the group, and were also paid a visit by two of the ‘grow leaders’ from Loughborough Farm, who complimented us on how good the garden was looking!

The squashes are looking good!

We found quite a few more volunteer tomatoes mixed in with the parsnips, but there was no space to move them to so we left them where they were and supported them with canes. Most of them already had fruit on them. We checked all the other tomatoes were properly supported and managed to harvest 3 that were ripe!

We also harvested lots of young carrots, some spinach and runner beans.

Everything looked in good order after all the clearing and planting that was done last week. We were just giving all the beds a really good water when there was a huge downpour!

Carrots, spinach, runner beans and a tomato

Posted: June 24, 2014

Our clever steering committee member Paula has written this recipe blogpost using last week’s harvest. Yum!

http://lunchforfreeatwork.blogspot.co.uk/2014/06/ruskin-garden-salad.html

Posted: June 22, 2014

Despite the fairly late change to a Saturday dig, we had most of the regulars and several new faces. The weather was perfect. We cleared out the bolted spinach and chard, planted French beans and beetroot, put netting on the purple sprouting broccoli (decimated by pigeons), watered, weeded, and harvested lettuce, broad beans, peas, radishes, onions, gooseberries, raspberries.

Trees for Cities were launching their garden, which is looking great. They are running veg growing training during the week. We are going to explore ways to work together. First off they’ve offered to build sturdy supports for our tomatoes and beans (thanks!!)

We are very happy to welcome Sadie to the steering committee!

Thrive have published this fab guide to veg growing

Beans in their new bed

Raspberry harvest

Gooseberry harvest

So pretty!

Fruit harvesting

The bees are busy!

Posted: June 19, 2014

The fruits of our labours are coming through now, literally! All the hard work preparing the soil, sowing the seeds, weeding, and watering has paid off and the beds are full of veg.

On Sunday we weeded and watered and harvested. The diggers agreed that I could take the harvest to the GLA judging visit for the Lambeth Food Flagship award. We had a huge pile of broad beans, potatoes, radishes, gooseberries, peas, raspberries, and lettuce. When Rosie Boycott, who’s judging the award, came to the Lambeth Food Partnership table, she asked if she could eat our peas. Have a look at the photo!

Posted: May 22, 2014

Last Sunday saw even more new gardeners, as well as some familiar faces. Maybe it was the glorious sunny weather that attracted everyone.

We planted out the the larger tomato plants into the beds, using canes to support them.
We also found a few volunteer tomatoes (ie plants that have grown on their own rather than being planted) which we dug up and potted for people to take home and try their hand at growing themselves.

There were some seeds that needed to be planted before they become unviable, so we planted turnips, radishes and courgettes straight into the beds.

After we’d finished planting, we gave all the beds a really good water.

Some beer traps have been laid to try and try and stop slugs helping themselves to the veg, but we will probably need to use some slug pellets too.

We harvested spinach and lettuce from the demonstration bed, plus a little rhubarb from the fruit cage – just enough for a small crumble! There are always herbs for those who want them too — we have a healthy supply of thyme, oregano, sage and mint.

Digging holes in the mandala bed for tomatoes

Tying the young tomato plants to canes

Planting courgette seeds

Patting down the earth around a tomato plant

Harvested rhubarb

Posted: May 13, 2014

Lots of helping hands on Sunday made short work of the weeds. As well as weeding, we earthed up the potatoes and we planted chard seeds in the demonstration bed.
We didn’t plant the tomatoes because it was so windy it could have damaged the stems – we’ll plant them next week.
We had the first harvest of the year – a big pile of lettuce and a big pile of spinach. It was absolutely delicious. The spinach was a bit nibbled by slugs so Justin’s going to try some beer traps.
The garden is looking great – well weeded and nearly all the beds are planted up. We should have a great harvest.

An action shot, weeding the gooseberries

Raspberries will be ready soon!

The mandala bed weeded and ready for tomatoes

Planting chard seeds

The first harvest of the season

Posted: April 28, 2014

We had a lovely, mostly sunny afternoon yesterday. We planted many of the seedlings that we started on 2nd February – purple sprouting broccoli, squash, peas, beans, and sunflowers. Really satisfying to nurture them from seed. We did quite a lot of weeding, and some watering. We used twigs pruned from the trees to create a climbing frame for the peas, and made a tripod from bamboo for the beans. The garden is looking great, and we should have a big harvest. Look for the sunflowers along the fence as you pass the garden.

We have a few extra PSB plants, get in touch if you’re interested.

The sunflowers that we planted as seeds on Feb 2 went in.

The fruit is looking great, particularly the rhubarb.

The bees are busy.

The broadbeans that we planted in November will be ready soon!

Purple sprouting broccoli seedlings planted out. We raised them from seed in the polytunnel – seeds started 2nd Feb.

Another bed of peas with sticks to grow on, mixed in with volunteer potatoes.

We’ve used sticks to build a frame for the peas to grow on.

Self-seeded tomato seedlings, rescued from weeding.

Posted: April 2, 2014

Visit www.treesforcities.org/growyourown for more information

Wednesday 23 April 2014

Sowing and planting spring veggies - beans and corn.

A look at tender vegetables, often with larger seeds, and how to grow legumes and corn.

Saturday 10 May 2014

Growing in small spaces - bags, troughs and pouches – and composting.

How to grow vegetables out of the soil using composts in assorted containers. Recycling waste into composted ‘gold-dust’ to nourish your soil.

Wednesday 21 May 2014

Know your bee and bees - fruit pollination, frost and plant protection

A ‘sex class ‘for gardeners to better understand pollination, simple genetics and protecting the flowers from Mother Nature.

Wednesday 18 June 2014

Plant foods and watering, pests and diseases, identification and controls - food ‘n’ drink for your plants and ‘critter controls’

A 5-Star Menu for plant foods and what they need for breakfast, lunch and tea. How to water efficiently with less. How to recognise and battle with 2, 4 or 8-legged garden enemies and nasty diseases that consume your plants. 

Wednesday 23 July 2014

Berries mean business - all the summer berries, red, black ‘n’ blue

A ‘how-to’ review of growing all the different coloured berries on bushes, canes and crowns. 

Wednesday 20 August 2014

Here Comes Summer! Seasonal work in the fruit and veg’ garden.

From successional sowing to weed/pest/disease controls, a chance to keep the season going. 

Saturday 30 August 2014

Get fruity! Know your fruit trees, canes and bushes

What to plant, how to plant, and when to make (identification and selection) a productive fruit garden to feed you year-round. A site walk-about and discussion.

 Wednesday 17 September 2014

 Know your soils and composts

A down-to-earth look at garden soil, how it works, how it can be improved, and what alternatives there are

Posted: March 2, 2014

We had a productive day in the garden. There are definitely signs of spring – the daffodils are beginning to come up. The overwintering broad beans and onions are looking good. And the seeds we planted four weeks ago are doing well in the polytunnel, thanks to our watering rota crew.
We weeded the fruit beds, much easier now that they’re protected by the fruit cage rather than netting. We also weeded a bed in the mandala bed.
And we planted a lot! We put in peas and chard in the veg beds. And nasturtiums, echinacea and poppies in the beds next to the beehives. We put twigs over the peas, as pea shoots are like candy to birds.
The crows have defeated our venetian blind labelling system, so we’ve tried something else this week. We’ve cut small white plastic pipes into lengths and written on them. Fingers crossed that will do the trick!

Posted: February 18, 2014

With nice weather today were were able to get on with the various tasks: digging compost into the beds, planting Purple Sprouting Broccoli and Broad Beans, weeding and turning the compost. The seedling pots in the polly tunnel looked saturated so we drained the trays – waterers might want to keep an eye on that. We’re trying out a new system for marking the beds – marker pen on strips of old Venetian Blind (which, being longer than the markers we’ve used before, might be more resistant to crow-vandalism!) The garden’s been tidied and is looking nice after recent building work work.

Posted: February 4, 2014

A good system allowed us to get lots of seeds planted on Sunday, including pumpkins, squash, sun flowers, tomatoes, spinach and chard. These are now in trays in the Polly tunnel where they’ll germinate over the next few weeks, some ready to plant when we meet in mid March. New garden infrastructure is almost complete. Next dig in two weeks time we’ll give the soil in the new raised beds some attention to make sure it’s ready for planting. We’ll also try to come up with a new system for marking the seeds planted – the crows have tended in the past to dig up our labels.  Purple Sprouting Broccoli and Broad Beans can be planted out and the compost can be turned.

Posted: January 31, 2014

Come along Sunday 2-4 to plant up pots with seeds – everything from tomatoes to squash. We’ll raise the seedlings in the polytunnel. In 6-8 weeks we’ll plant them out and sell the spares to raise money for next year’s seeds and tools.
We’ll need to set up a watering rota so please get in touch if you can spare 15 min a week.

Posted: January 19, 2014

We had a nice day in the garden, with low winter sun. There wasn’t a huge amount to do as nothing can be planted in January. We dug up all the parsnips from the bed – a bit like a treasure hunt as there were loads that weren’t visible. Our friendly robin stayed near to pounce on the exposed worms. And there are lots of worms in the soil, a sign of healthy soil. We each took home a big pile of parsnips, enough to make soup. The cold has prevented the weeds from growing, so we did the little weeding there was to do.
The overwintering broad beans, garlic and onions are looking good. The Trees for Cities work is well underway, with the compost beds being built. Still to go is the fruit cage and raised bed in the front.
Next dig day is 2 Feb, 2-4pm. We’ll be planting up seeds in pots to raise in the greenhouse. Some to plant out in the beds and some to sell to raise money for seeds, tools, etc.

Posted: January 14, 2014

From Trees for Cities:
Thank you to those of you who came along to help with some of the planting in the new garden in November last year. We have two more dates for your diary. On 15 & 16 January, 11am to 3pm, we will be planting the fruiting espalier tree hedge and we would love it if you could come along and help. The hedge will form the boundary between Community Training area of the garden and the Ruskin Park Community Garden, create a new screen along the green fence that separates the garden from the footpath and of course, in years to come, it will provide lots of delicious fruit. Please reply to this email to let me know if you would like to attend and on which day, please also let me know your most up-to-date mobile number.

Paul Beney will be the site supervisor on the day, 07825 541131. He will give you a demonstration on how to plant trees as well as providing you with a pair of gloves and a spade. Please make sure you are wearing suitable clothing that you do not mind getting muddy. Layers are helpful so you can adjust to the weather and waterproofs are recommended in case of rain. You will need a sturdy pair of boots or shoes, trainers are not sufficient. We do have some boots available to borrow if you don’t have any of your own. We also recommend you bring some lunch, snacks and a drink to keep you going if you plan to spend the whole day planting.

We will be in touch with details of the upcoming training sessions soon. Please pass this on to friends or relatives who might be interested, they are welcome to get in touch with me directly. If you have any other questions in the meantime, please do not hesitate to get in touch.

Posted: November 25, 2013

We had a really productive day yesterday, planting up onions, garlic and broad beans. Getting the veg in the ground now means we’ll get an earlier crop next spring.  We also weeded, and all the beds are looking great.

The new fence around the bees looks amazing. It’s from the planter boxes that were up at the South Bank.

Next dig day will be 8 December 1-3pm.

Posted: October 27, 2013

Posted: October 18, 2013

6pm-10pm Saturday 19th October 2013
Garden Museum 5 Lambeth Palace Rd SE1 7LB

Posted: October 7, 2013

We had a fantastic day in the garden yesterday. The warm sunny weather brought out the diggers and we got loads done. We dug out the rest of the potatoes and Jerusalem artichokes, weeded nearly all the beds, and tidied up in preparation for the coming improvements in the garden. Trees for Cities has won a Pocket Parks grant which will be used to improve the area outside their offices and parts of the community garden. One of the most exciting improvements is a forest garden in the shady area in the front near the Denmark Hill end. Forest gardens are a permaculture concept and we’re hoping to organise a workshop on their design and maintenance.

Seb the beekeeper was there to do some hive maintenance.

Posted: October 1, 2013

Good work done this week. Seeing that blight was beginning to appear on the tomatoes we decided to pick what we could and prepare those beds – perhaps for winter planting. Some of the green tomatoes are in the shed for ripening. We’ll make chutney with the rest. We dug out a barrow-load of nice-looking compost. There’s plenty more ready for use. Also harvested this week: Crab Apples.

Posted: September 23, 2013

We celebrated our fourth annual Harvest Feast on Saturday. It’s still a thrill to eat what we’ve grown, and it seems to taste particularly delicious. The table was overflowing with tasty dishes – jerusalem artichoke soup, roasted jerusalem artichokes, apple pie, pesto, potato/rosemary bread, crabapple jelly tarts, beetroot/carrot salad, fried green tomatoes, spinach/tomato salad, roasted pumpkin, sautéed kale, green tomato chutney, and more. We had a steady stream of eaters with many people keen to come back and dig on another day. We celebrated with the staff and gardeners from Thrive; it was great to meet them as we’re in the garden at different times. Thanks to Andrew for fab folk songs and sea shanties on the accordion, and to the Lewisham Concert Orchestra.

More pics here.

Posted: September 17, 2013

Final preparations are underway. Thrive have their dish list (pictured) and let us harvest kale (pictured) and pumpkin which we’ll cook and bring on the day. Lots of other dishes including crab apple jelly tarts (made with the crab apples in the community garden), roasted jerusalem artichokes, carrot/beetroot salad, and spinach and tomato salad. The weather looks decent and the Lewisham Brass Band will be playing.
So come along!!! 2-5pm, free, all welcome. If you want to bring something to share, please try to keep it local. Hope to see you there!!!

Posted: September 9, 2013

Despite rain showers we had a very nice day at the garden yesterday. The weeds have been thriving in the rain, so we tackled them. The beds are looking really well tended. We harvested potatoes and tomatoes – the potatoes are absolutely delicious and taste nothing like supermarket ones.

The lettuce and radish seeds we planted last week have come up!

We’ve got carrots, tomatoes, beetroot, spinach, lettuce, potatoes, jerusalem artichokes, and courgettes to harvest for the harvest feast (Sat 21 Sept 2-5pm). We’ll harvest the potatoes and jerusalem artichokes this coming Sunday so people can take them to prepare a dish for the feast at home. Do come along this Sunday 3-5pm if you fancy cooking something.

We need a camp stove! Please get in touch info@ruskinparkcommunitygarden.org if you have one we can borrow for the Harvest Feast.

Posted: September 6, 2013

Come along for a meal of veg grown in the garden. We’ll harvest the week before (Sunday Sept 15 3-5pm) and bring the prepared food to the feast. The Thrive folks will be there with food as well, and info about their project. And Seb promises to bring his ukelele! Free of charge, all welcome!

Posted: September 1, 2013

We had a lovely productive day in the garden. We cleared the front bed and planted lettuce, radish and turnip – something to harvest in the darker days of winter. We also planted lettuce in on of the raised planters. Neil defeated the brambles that were attacking the compost and did quite a lot of strimming. We did lots of other weeding and watering, and harvested tomatoes, potatoes, blackberries, and onions. The garden is looking well loved.

We also harvested crabapples to make jelly – here’s a recipe. http://www.bbcgoodfood.com/recipes/7661/crab-apple-jelly. Delicious and easy.

The harvest feast is September 21, details to follow. We’ll prepare veg harvested from the garden and have a shared meal. Hopefully Seb will come with his ukelele and Andrew will bring his percussion instruments.

Posted: August 15, 2013

We had a lovely sunny afternoon at the garden. Lots of weeding and tidying was done by Daniel, Darren & Kate. Neil and Maureen picked an abundance of blackberries, some beetroot & we shared a few potatoes that were dug up. Everything was given a good lot of water.

The tomato plants are looking healthy with lots of tomatoes on them – looking forward to enjoying them soon!

On the bee front this week, the beekeepers (Seb and Neil) gave the hive some attention to help out the bees and they are looking pretty happy.

Harvest Feast – we will be holding our annual harvest feast on Saturday 21st September. There will be yummy food to enjoy (mostly grown in the garden) and it’s a lovely time to enjoy being in the garden. More details to follow soon but make sure you have it in the diary!

Posted: July 31, 2013

We had a super productive afternoon at the community garden with only a few of the predicted

rain showers interspersed with sun!

The demonstration beds were cleared & tidied, worm juice was given to the tomatoes, a few squash plants were planted out and we did a good amount of harvesting!Justin dug a load of potatoes up, Maureen dug some lovely coloured beetroot & a few onions and Kate pulled up all the garlic & has braided them together to hang & dry ready to bring back to the garden over the coming months.

Take a look at our harvest!

Posted: July 14, 2013

A lovely day for sitting around and enjoying the heat – consequently not much gardening done today. The beds have had a good water though. Some work has been done managing the bees, which have been extremely busy building comb in various directions over the last few weeks. The tomatoes are looking healthy, as are the potatoes and the Jerusalem Artichokes. Next week more work can be done on the front beds – still looking a bit in need of attention.

Posted: July 7, 2013

We had a lovely afternoon at the garden in the hot sun. We watered everything and harvested raspberries, black currants, gooseberries, rocket, radishes, and broad beans. We did quite a lot of weeding, and started work on trimming excess leaves from the tomatoes and staking them. Thanks very much to the person who donated the fantastic bamboo canes, they came in handy. Great to see new faces, old faces, and new-ish faces. A few of us were regularly checking the Wimbledon scores on our phone, and being cheered by the good news.
The garden is looking great. The onions and garlic are nearly ready to harvest. In the next few weeks we’ll start to have lots of potatoes, then loads of tomatoes and salad, and a good crop of chard and celeriac and carrots. And jerusalem artichokes and squash. The beds have really benefited from the application of manure earlier in the year. We left the borage in because the bees were loving the flowers. It is great to have bees again, and how cool to get them via a swarm!

Posted: July 6, 2013

We had a lovely sunny dig on Sunday 30th June. There were 4 of us and we netted the salad and fruit beds to protect the crops from birds. Some of the fruit beds were weeded as well as the demonstration bed. Lots of watering was done too.

We had a lovely harvest of broad beans, rhubarb onions and garlic.

Posted: June 21, 2013

Transplanting salad seedlings

Last Sunday there were 3 of us at the garden on a nice & warm afternoon. We gave the broad beans some attention, staking them, cutting the tops off & spraying them with ecofriendly cleaner to help remove the black fly that have arrived.

Happy seedlings

We then tackled the big job of transplanting the salad seedlings from one of the hospital beds where they were running out of space. They are now housed in 2 hospital beds as well as the new bed alongside the fence. Lots of rocket and lettuce seedlings with much more space to fully grow now. You can watch them grow as you pass by the garden over the next few weeks.

Don’t forget there isn’t a dig day this Sunday as we will be at the Ruskin Park Summer Fair on Saturday 1-5pm. Hope you can come by our stall. Dig days will continue again from next Sunday.

Posted: June 13, 2013

Weeding and watering; work done on the front bed, which is ready for planting now. Compost is still waiting to be turned. There’s some more grass-cutting that could be done. Some of the fruit beds need netting. Everything’s coming up nicely.

Posted: June 2, 2013

Excellent work done this week. Seeds planted include swede, kale, radish, lettuce, broccoli, sprouts and squash. The front bed has been prepared. We’re hoping to get sunflowers planted in there along with what’s on the planting plan. And some more time has been spent cutting the grass too. Within the next week or two we’ll try to get a watering rota organised, and hope for good yields as the weather warms up.

Posted: May 26, 2013

We’ve planted some Sunflower seeds – just in pots for now. Hopefully they can be put in the ground in a week or two when they’ve germinated – and when we’ve had time to prepare the front bed. The wormery has had some attention. Some more of the long grass has been cut. And we’ve give the beds a good watering.

Posted: May 22, 2013

Posted: May 19, 2013

One or two new volunteers helped us make good progress today at the garden. We planted potatoes, beetroot, parsnips and onions, prepared beds for planting next week, weeded the beans and over-wintered onions, and cut the grass.

Posted: May 17, 2013

Despite the rain we have a pretty good turn out & enough muscle power to put the polytunnel cover on – wahay! We’ve now got somewhere to grow seedlings and to shelter out of the rain…

The bee hive was fully sterilised last week & is ready for new bees so keep your ears to the ground in case anyone is looking for somewhere for a home for some, we’re obviously very keen to fill the hive again.
It was a bit of spring cleaning day all round with the worms and the wormery getting a good bit of tlc from Justin. The grass was also strimmed & we harvested rocket, spinach & rhubard – yum!

Sorry for the lack of photos (the rain kept the cameras firmly hidden!), promise to take some this Sunday but if you’re passing through the park you can see evidence that the polytunnel now has plastic on for yourself! Or on Sunday at the dig.

Posted: May 7, 2013

We had a lovely dig in the warm afternoon sun. After doing a bit of weeding, we dug trenches for potatoes and planted them up. We did some more weeding, adding lots of worm compost to a bed, then planted three varieties of squash (squash need lots of nutrients). And we weeded some more then planted two varieties of carrots. We also planted tomato seedlings, and built a bamboo support for them.

The overwintered broad beans are looking good, as are the onions.

Posted: April 28, 2013

It was good to see some new volunteers today. We planted squash, lettuce and spinach, broad beans & courgettes.

The sad news is that the bees have not survived. It’s not clear exactly why, but weather and disease are likely to have been contributing factors. We will try to get another colony established later in the year. The advice is to clear out and sterilize the hive, which we’ll do in the next few weeks. In the meantime it’s been sealed to stop bees or other insects getting in, a measure against possible infection. There is some honey. We’ll drain it from the comb then jar it to share with community gardeners.

Posted: April 19, 2013

Pictures show what’s been growing over winter: beans, garlic and onions. The onions have not done very well – all except for one row which, coincidentally, is the one not covered by the netting. Any explanations?

Posted: April 1, 2013

Lovely to be in the garden and see a little bit of spring. We did quite a lot of weeding, particularly in the herb bed which was overrun with grass. At times the sun shone brightly and at times it snowed.
The daffodils are blooming, and ducks have taken up residence in our micro-pond. Three of them were feasting on something at the bottom of the pond.
Mystery solved! For years our small white plastic veg tags have been dug out of the ground and strewn around by something. Yesterday we saw black birds aggressively pecking at the white plastic tags on the newly planted shrubs next door. They must think the tags are food!
Despite all odds, our overwintering broad beans are thriving, and the rhubarb is growing well. The compost has been spread over all the beds, replenishing the soil. All in all the garden is looking well loved.

Posted: March 25, 2013

A cold day at the garden – good day for digging! Hopefully the ditch round the polytunnel is deep enough now so we can get the plastic on soon.

Posted: March 20, 2013

Look forward to seeing you this Sunday 1-3pm. There’s lots of planting to be done (tomatoes, lettuce, chard, spinach, sunflowers, carrots & parsnips) and if we get enough hands on deck we can finish putting the polytunnel up, just in time to keep our seedlings warm.

Today we planted lots of broad beans & peas with a local nursery group (in the hail!) & the seeds would love to be moved out of the shed & into the polytunnel.

We had a really successful day on Sunday 10th with 6 of us braving the cold, and rewarded ourselves with a slice (or 2) of lovely Mother’s Day cake that Jackie & Esme brought. We planted jerusalem artichokes, dug in the green manure to help it mix in with the soil, cleared the leaves out of the pond (with Esme getting in the pond), dug a trench around the polytunnel frame and covered the round bed with compost. We also harvested some beetroot & found a few stray potatoes amongst the green manure!

See you on Sunday!

Posted: February 11, 2013

Too cold and wet for much work on the garden this weekend. We secured the fleece over the beans, checked the compost containers and the wormery, then closed up early. Here are some pictures taken during recent snow.

Posted: January 30, 2013

Dear Gardeners,

Call for help! If you have a bit of time to spare this afternoon and would like to get some exercise – please come down to the garden to help us move compost & manure from 1.30pm. They have been delivered to help us nourish the planting beds but couldn’t be deposited in the garden so have got to be moved! We’ve got wheelbarrows, spades & gloves but need some muscle power – after all many hands make light work!

It was a lovely sunny, if not a bit windy, afternoon on Sunday in the garden. We investigated how the compost bins are doing and turned & watered one of the pallet bins to encourage it to rot down – its looking very good!
We also had a lovely encounter with the resident robin getting very close to Seb’s big boots and singing to us! Can you spot it?

Posted: January 13, 2013

We had a lovely day in the garden today. It was cold and sunny. We weren’t sure what there was to do but ended up being really productive. Neil built a new compost bin for the raked leaves. In making room for the new bin we dug out a lot of compost ready to use on the beds, so we covered the squash bed with a thick layer. We put the recycled plastic edging around the front bed – it will stop the grass from encroaching. We did quite a lot of weeding. Justin tended the wormery. We covered up the second pea and broad bean bed with fleece, and the spinach in the front with netting (the birds were munching it).
We harvested rocket and the rest of the brussels sprouts and cabbage.

Posted: December 30, 2012

We dug out the old broccoli today and harvested some sprouts, weeded the onion bed, replanted some of the garlic bulbs (probably dug up by squirrels) then hoed the rest of the bed. Also used the strimmer to tidy up the edges. The fruit bed nearest the shed has been tidied and dug over, and the netting frames straightened.

The soil seems pretty saturated. It might be good to get compost dug in soon if we can. There are more sprouts to harvest next dig, and beetroots. Daffodils are coming up already under the willow tree.

Posted: December 22, 2012

Dig It!

Dig It! is a community food growing project reaching disabled people and the wider community living in Wandsworth, Lambeth and Southwark and will  operate from Larkhall and Ruskin Parks starting in November 2012.

Dig It! aims to encourage disabled people, particularly those living with mental ill health to:

• gain vocational and volunteering skills
• improve their job prospects
• improve their health and well being
• become active members of their community
• participate in affordable food growing to understand the benefits of healthy living

Dig It! is comprised of two proven and established Thrive programmes:

Working it Out

A vocational training and personal development programme designed to enable unemployed disabled Londoners to gain the skills and qualifications they need to progress towards employment.

Pathways

A supported volunteering programme which is designed to enable people to develop volunteering skills; to overcome their disability related barriers to independence and move on to take up volunteer roles in the community – specifically in the Dig It! food growing gardens after the end of the project placement.

Both gardening programmes will run on various weekdays:

• Ruskin Park
  • Working it Out
  • Pathways

Both 1 day per week on a Monday

• Larkhall Park
  • Working it Out
  • Pathways session

Both 1 day per week on a Wednesday, Thursday or Friday

If you would like anymore information on Thrives programmes please contact

Shirley Wisbach on 020 7720 2212 or email shirley.wisbach@thrive.org.uk

Posted:

We dug up the last of the Rocket today, cleared that bed and put some of the newly produced worm-cast in. The circular bed has also had work done on its border with bricks added – previously being used in the shed for shelving but no longer needed there now we’ve got a new upright unit. Some of the leaves raked and piled last week have been bagged. We wonder if anyone from the park will be willing to remove them, although notice there doesn’t seem to be much leaf-clearing going on elsewhere. The beds with fleece are not looking too good. Maybe next time we can find a better solution. Otherwise, bees looking happy, onions surviving despite the squirrels.

Posted: December 18, 2012

From Capital Growth:

We’ve done it!

The Capital Growth team is really pleased to announce that we’ve reached the target of supporting 2,012 community food-growing spaces in London by the end of 2012.

The 2,012th space was announced on Friday, 14th December as St Charles Centre for Health and Wellbeing in Kensington & Chelsea. For further information about the project, as well as what has been achieved in the last 4 years, please go to http://www.capitalgrowth.org/press/14_12_2012/ and to join in the celebration visit us on facebook www.facebook.com/capitalgrowth or post on twitter @capital_growth #wemadeit

We’d like to remind everyone that our work doesn’t stop here. We’ll be back in 2,013 to support the projects in our network as well as others who want to grow food in London.

Finally, we’d like to thank everyone for their help and involvement over the last four years, whether you are a member of one of the 22 borough councils who committed to supporting Capital Growth, one of the Local Lead groups who supported spaces in your borough on behalf of Capital Growth, or one of the 98,000 people who have been growing food at a space supported by Capital Growth.

See you in 2013!

The Capital Growth team

Posted: December 15, 2012

Kate’s saved some old carpet, pallets, shelving, and a wooden rack. We rented a zipvan and took it to the garden. We’ll use the carpet to cover bare beds (prevent weeds from growing, nutrients washing away) and to cover the compost (the hotter it is the faster it decomposes). The wooden rack is perfect to support peas or beans. And the shelving has already found a home in the shed.

Posted: December 2, 2012

There was loads of garlic as it happens – now all in the ground )

Beautiful wintry weather for a bit of gardening;

we dug over the compost heaps a little, and spread some of the more mature stuff on the beds

we’ve covered the beans and peas with some fleece

we planted several rows of garlic

we harvested the last of the jerusalem artichokes (quote impressive!), as well as taking a little rocket and some sage

Posted: November 18, 2012

We had a nice sunny dig day, weeding, harvesting, and getting the garden ready for winter. The garden is looking well loved. We’re on top of the weeding, raking, and grass trimming. We’ve got broad beans, peas and onions in for the winter. And we still have spinach, runner beans, broccoli, cabbage, leeks, radishes, and jerusalem artichokes going.  The bees are still busily buzzing around.

We put fleece over the broad beans. They’ll overwinter and be ready early in the season, but they’ve gotten big enough that they need protection. We’ll get more fleece to finish covering them and also to cover the other bed of peas and broad beans.  Also we’ll get some garlic to plant up at the next dig day. We’ll need to put edging around the new bed in the front, otherwise the grass will take over.

The very friendly robin was standing by as we weeded, ready to snack on any worms we dug up.

We had a great harvest of runner beans, broccoli, cabbage, brussels sprouts, radishes, and sprout tops.

Posted: November 6, 2012

well it was a typical autumn day with blustery wet spells (which i think gave us the low turnout) however the rain passed and we were left with enough people power and enthusiasm to do the jobs on the list. Firstly Neil did a great job of getting the shelves in the shed up and running to finally get some order in there and the rest of us were left to dig a hole in the ground and then put a membrane in the hole and fill that membrane with sand and water. This has left the RPCG with its newest addition of extra spaces…a pond. This is very much an experiment to see if a pond works for all the residents of the gardens but for now fingers crossed as it was back breaking work for two of us for the afternoon. We also harvested a couple of squash which were delicious, i found this recipe for them. http://spryliving.com/recipes/crusted-pumpkin-wedges-with-sour-cream/

Posted: November 1, 2012

We had a lovely sunny Sunday at the Community Garden this week. We tackled the big and seemingly endless job of raking leaves & will be using the leaves to make leaf mulch in a years time. The wormery was tended to by Justin & the liquid gold was given to some of the young plants. Neil began building shelves for the shed and we had a lovely harvest of jerusalem artichokes, beetroot, squash, mini radishes and a few tomatoes.

We look forward to seeing you this Sunday - lots to do!

Posted: October 21, 2012

Too dull for decent pictures today but they show: one or two new fruit-bush frames, work on herb beds to cut back the more vigorous plants – lemon thyme especially, bubble-wrap round wormery to keep it functioning as the weather gets colder, path cleared between the willow tree and the front bed, beans coming up nicely. We harvested a few Jerusalem Artichokes, which look better than the last lot; also bean, spinach and herbs.

Posted: October 16, 2012

WANTED! GARDENING VOLUNTEERS

Between the Tracks – the after school club for the Lairdale, Peabody Hill and Rosendale Road estates – needs volunteers to help run a gardening project.

You should enjoy being with young people and know how to pass on your basic gardening skills.

This is a great opportunity to launch young people on the path to becoming enthusiastic gardeners.

You would need to be free on Mondays or Wednesdays 3.30–6.00, preferably weekly.

All volunteers have to complete a CRB check.

Interested? Contact Christopher Pick 07432 118859 info@4-all.org.uk

Posted:

It was a sunny but chilly day. We weeded quite a lot, and got started digging a new bed in the front. We had a varied harvest of tomatoes, courgette, broccoli, brussels sprouts, runner beans, carrots, rocket, and radishes. This is the first year we’ve had any success with brussels sprouts, very exciting. If you walk by the garden you can see the pretty scarlet flowers on the runner beans. They are supported by one of the veg supports we built with skip wood. We’ve just had another successful skip dive (the owners were very happy to have us take their old loft beams) so we’ll be able to finish the supports for the fruit netting and build another veg support.

Posted: October 12, 2012

We put some netting on one of the big frames today, then positioned it over the recently planted beans, transplanting a few which would have been left exposed otherwise.

Some research on proposed pond-building suggests the corner we’d thought suitable might not in fact be ideal – apparently a pond should be in direct sun and not under trees where falling leaves can be a problem. But since we don’t have too many choice spots maybe it’s worth giving it a shot and digging where we planned anyhow.

There are some beans ready to harvest in the front bed, and another squash or two ready, more Jerusalem Artichokes to pick, and some spinach.

The strimmer is working again – new guard fitted.

Posted: October 2, 2012

New onion bed under netting

We had a lovely warm and dry afternoon on Sunday at the community garden. There were only 3 of us volunteering but we got a good amount done. Lots of peas and some broad bean seeds were planted. Onion sets were also planted and netting was put up to try to keep squirrels off from squashing them – do keep an eye on these as if the netting doesn’t do the job we may have to use the stick technique from the last few years.

Bed 3 was weeded and marigolds from bed 8 were transplanted along the edge, where tomatoes will be grown next year. We also had a lovely harvest of squash, spinach, yellow tomatoes and I’ve taken the sunflower heads home to dry them (they were being enjoyed by wildlife!).

Harvest

We had quite a few visitors who wanted to have a look around – don’t forget to come along on Sundays afternoons to see what we’ve been up to recently even if you don’t have time to volunteer at the moment!

Posted: October 1, 2012

Posted: September 24, 2012

The beginning of the summer was incredibly wet, so yesterday’s soggy feast was a fitting end. Despite difficult growing conditions we had a reasonable harvest and a really delicious feast. Neil’s jerusalem artichoke soup was very yummy, and warming. Mastoor brought some piquant spiced apple and Mark brought tasty bread that included community garden potatoes and homegrown rosemary. We had jam tarts made from last year’s crabapple jelly. And carrot/beetroot salad, sauteed courgettes, salad with radish and tomatoes, steamed broccoli, and potato salad. Not sure if it was because it was so fresh or just from the novelty of cooking outdoors, but it all seemed particularly tasty. We also got to taste a tiny bit of the honey from our bees. It had a really distinctive taste, maybe from all the herbs in the garden.
Claudia from Trees for Cities came along so we could use their kitchen, and was a big help with washing the veg as well as being great company. Thanks to Jean for the loan of her camp stove, and to Local Greens for the use of their marquee.
Very wet, but very fun and very tasty.

Posted: September 20, 2012

We had a lovely day at the garden weeding and planting. We had a final look to see what’s going to be ready for the harvest feast and planned the menu. Despite a bad year for veg (because of the wet weather) we’ve got lots to eat.
The sunflowers are in full bloom.

Posted: September 18, 2012

Please come, all welcome!
We’ll harvest and cook the veg, then eat together, have a brief bees talk and some music.
On the menu:
beetroot/carrot salad
roasted squash
sauteed courgettes
steamed broccoli
salad – spinach, tomatoes, radish
jerusalem artichoke soup
Please bring something to drink. And if you want to bring food, the theme is local, e.g. an apple crumble from local apples. Hope to see you Sunday!

Posted: September 13, 2012

Posted:

A very productive day’s work in the garden, in glorious late summer sunshine

Main tasks were preparing some of the beds (clearing, weeding, feeding), allowing us to sow some turnips, spinach and winter lettuce, as well as some green manure (the Phaecelia that was so successful last year). A whole extra unexpected crop of potatoes was unearthed in the process…

In addition there was lots of weeding, watering, trimming and general tidying, and the compost heaps got some much-needed attention. We’ve started the process of returning some of that goodness to the soil, with several barrowloads of compost added to the existing beds.

Posted: September 6, 2012

We had a lovely late summer day, and with all the tending the garden is looking great. We did a fair amount of weeding, took out the blighted tomatoes, watered, and harvested tomatoes, green tomatoes, beans, spinach, oregano, courgettes, broccoli, raspberries, and blackberries.
We’ll use the green tomatoes from the blighted plants for chutney, ready for the harvest feast. It’s been a bad year for blight because of the wet weather. Here’s some more info

Unlike last year when they were groaning with fruit, the crab apples have hardly any fruit. The cold wet weather has severely reduced the apple and pear crop this year. Here’s an article about it.
On a happier note, the Harvest Feast will be 23 September. We’ll have a dig day 4-5pm, while some of us harvest and prepare the veg. Then the feast will be 5-7pm. Seb promises to bring his ukelele, and to give an update on the bees, which are thriving. Please come along! If you fancy it bring a dish prepared from local food. We’ll have jam tarts from blackberries harvested from Norwood Cemetery and plums harvested from Sainsbury’s parking lots.
We’re about to start our winter planting – winter salad, green manure, and in November overwintering broad beans and peas.

Posted: August 21, 2012

Well well what a August dig day it was, heavy afternoon shower over the garden just to make us think there was one less job on the list. However the general temperature was so high that rainfall soon evaporated and five of us set about weeding the beds, trimming the sides, preparing the wire for the beans to grow and harvesting a fine crop of potatoes, carrots, beans and some delicious blackberries.
Sadly the strimmer has taken a turn for the worse so we will be cutting the grass with scissors until repair, not an enviable task! Only kidding on the scissor front.
The fruit beds are all coming on nicely and hope to have them all protected from the birds before long.

Regards,

The community gardeners.

Posted: August 12, 2012

We had a busy productive dig in the hot sun today. We planted lettuce, spinach, and radishes, weeded, watered, trimmed the grass, took excess leaves off the tomatoes, and took the last of the broad beans out. We harvested green beans, broad beans, potatoes, cauliflower, broccoli, courgette, and garlic. The garden is looking great – well tended and bountiful.
A new volunteer, Justin, has donated his wormery. Wormeries compost food waste very effectively and produce amazing compost. A big thanks to Justin from our veg beds!

Posted: August 2, 2012

Several of us braved a brief thunderstorm and ended up weeding in the sunshine. And we did loads of weeding! The beds are looking really good. Neil started to put the netting up to protect the fruit bushes from the birds. We planted runner beans in the front. We got a great harvest of french beans, broad beans, garlic, potatoes, and herbs.

Posted: July 27, 2012

One or two new volunteers helped us make good progress with the weeding. The front beds are also looking a bit tidier, seeds sprouting in the raised beds. Some strimming was done too (strimmer needs a new wire). We staked the tomato plants. Decided not to harvest, so there will be beans to pick this coming Sunday

Posted: July 15, 2012

We had a brilliant day in the garden – the sun was out and loads of people came.  Several newish volunteers and one, James, who was once a regular but hadn’t been for a year. All those hands meant we got tons done and the garden is looking quite a bit better. At the front we strimmed, weeded all the beds, removed the ammunition boxes which never worked as planters, and planted runner beans, chard, spinach, lettuce, radish, and beetroot. It’s still a mystery what ate the potatoes plants – at one point they seemed to be thriving. We cleared out the finished broad beans, and dug up some potatoes – Kestrel, a delicious variety with purple bits on the skin. We weeded most beds, and admired our first courgette. Quite a lot of the long grass got strimmed as well. And we planted out the basil plants that Jackie bought from Brockwell Park Community Greenhouses. The carrots, sunflowers, beans, squash, peas, and tomatoes are all coming on. The brassicas are getting a bit munched even though they’re netted, but I think we’ll get something from them.

Posted: July 8, 2012

Thanks to all for braving the rain today. Excellent work done weeding the fruit beds. We’ve also planted two or three more tomato plants, which were outgrowing their pots, and a couple of basil plants – not sure if they’re the right place but they can be moved if not. It was too wet to use the strimmer today, so that’s a job for next weekend. The garden is well watered at the moment! Bees looking happy.

Posted: July 4, 2012

We had a lovely afternoon in the sun yesterday after a short sharp burst of rain at the beginning. Seb came along for a little bit to check on the bees & Ryan, a new volunteer, turned up – thank god as no one else came  all afternoon. We tidied up the entrance by the gate & did some litter picking. Lots of weeding of the broad bean bed & trimming the grass around the bed and a bit around the courgettes/potatoes. It looks much tidier but still lots & lots of weeding to be done in the coming weeks after all this rain! I also showed a few people around that came passed. Some seedlings are finally coming up after a bit of sun including carrots so keep an eye out for these emerging.

To be able to catch up on all the work – especially after last week not having a proper dig day & this week just being 2 of us – we really need lots of people down to help out in the coming weeks.

Harvested lots broad beans & a few gooseberries.

Posted:

London Wildlife Trust is calling on Londoners to report any sightings of stag beetles this summer in order to help improve conservation measures for this fascinating globally endangered creature. We also want to know about lesser stag beetle sightings across London. http://www.wildlondon.org.uk/stag-beetle-survey-2011-12
As well as recording your sightings of stag beetles there’s lots you can do to help them, especially if you have access to a garden. Download the stag beetle advice note for guidance on how to build a stag beetle log pile and for some great wildlife gardening tips and advice take a look at our Wildlife Gardening Pack.

Seen a stag beetle this year? Complete our Stag Beetle Survey to let us know!

How to spot a stag beetle

• You are most likely to find a stag beetle near or on dead wood
• It’s between 5cm and 8cm long
• It’s got large antler shaped jaws
• The male’s jaws are very large
• The female’s jaws are smaller but more powerful
• Adults emerge from the soil beneath logs or tree stumps from mid-May til late July
• Males are often seen flying on sultry summer evenings an hour or two before dusk

Posted: June 26, 2012

Thanks to Friends of Ruskin Park for putting on a fantastic event. Loads of people, no rain, and festive music. We sent lots of kids home with planted up seeds. Thanks very much to Kate for organising the stall and Cosmo for peopling it. Mark ran the dig day but didn’t have many takers as the fete was so alluring. He did a bunch of weeding by his lonesome

Posted:

The Cockney sparrow was once a regular fixture in our London gardens, parks and squares. However, the city lost 68% of them between 1994 and 2000. The RSPB are asking Londoners to spend an hour, sometime between 18 June and 12 July, looking for house sparrows in their gardens and/or local green spaces and parks. It will help identify where populations are doing well, just clinging on or faring badly.

The survey can be done anywhere in Greater London and the more people that get involved, the better the information will be! The information you give them will help inform their conservation efforts to save this iconic London bird. For further information and access to the survey site visit www.rspb.org.uk/sparrowcount or email CSC@rspb.org.uk

The project is being run in partnership with the London Wildlife Trust and Greenspace information for Greater London (GiGL) as part of the London Biodiversity Partnership.

Posted: June 18, 2012

We’ll be there running a seed planting stall, and will have our dig day at the same time (no dig Sunday).

Posted:

We had a sunny (yeah!) productive day. We did quite a lot of weeding. Roger and Naomi started on the fruit beds, which have lots of grass in them. Mark, Nicola, Naomi, and I worked on the mandala bed, and we edged most of the bed with bricks recovered from a skip – it’s looking great. Neil and Mark strimmed the grass, which had gotten very long with all the rain we’ve had. Nicole and the boys did quite a lot of watering, and we planted sunflowers. And I planted up the marigolds donated by Jill (the Local Greens packing manager) next to the tomatoes and squash.

They are a companion plant: “MARIGOLDS: (Calendula): Given a lot of credit as a pest deterrent. Keeps soil free of bad nematodes; supposed to discourage many insects. Plant freely throughout the garden. The marigolds you choose must be a scented variety for them to work. One down side is that marigolds do attract spider mites and slugs.” We harvested broad beans, onions, carrots, and radishes.

Posted: June 12, 2012

We had a productive afternoon in the garden this week despite the promise of rain. Good to see that the weather forecast didn’t put off two new people, Diane & Naomi, from coming along.
We gave the broad beans some attention by nipping the black fly tops off & spraying them with ecover. Lots of weeding was done in the vegetable beds. carrot seeds were planted in the mandala bed, lettuce & turnip seeds planted in bed 4 (either side of the radishes). Tomatoes, onions & broad beans were supported/protected with sticks. Radishes & onions were thinned & harvested, also got a few broad beans & carrots. netting was re supported in a few beds, particularly to stop the birds getting at the brassicas.

Posted: June 3, 2012

We had a jubilee dig. We weeded, planted chard and turnips, put twine up between the fruit supports, and put in a permanent hosepipe from the tap. We harvested broad beans, radishes, and oregano. All the seedlings we put in last week are settling in.
The header tank is full now so watering will be much easier. Neil is going to organise a rota so if you can help please email info@ruskinparkcommunitygarden.org.

Posted: June 1, 2012

Pictures of some of the freshly made comb. Created entirely by our bees in the short time they have been there. Really shows that they are settling in and busy improving things. Full of eggs and pupae as well. Amazing!

Seb

Posted: May 27, 2012

We had a lovely warm day in the garden.  We planted courgette, butternut squash, french beans, and tomato seedlings. We weeded and watered. Cosmo strimmed the grass. We have been able to start using compost that we’ve made, very exciting.

Cosmo put up the sign he had made about dig days, it looks great and lots of people stopped to read it.

We harvested the first of the broad beans, some juicy radishes, and the rest of the chicory (it had bolted). The gooseberries are nearly ready to harvest and the white currants should follow soon after. The onions are nearly ready as well.

The bees were buzzing away, going in and out of the hive. Nice to have them keep us company.

Posted: May 22, 2012

We had a super productive afternoon. Planted lots of veg straight into the beds – parsnips, courgettes, scorconzera, squash plus one pumpkin (thanks to Esmie)

Everyone did a great job digging in compost on both sides of the polytunnel beds. These are now ready for the polytunnel to go up.

The last of the green manure was pulled out & courgettes seeds were panted in-between the random potatoes that have popped up.

Andrew trimmed the grass around some of the beds. Fruit beds also got some more weeding.

Had to do lots of trips with watering cans to the tap at the one o’clock club as the hose still hasn’t reappeared!

Seb has been observing the bees too.

Posted: May 18, 2012

Grow your own veg – a free daytime workshop by Local Greens and Garden Organic

Friday 1st June, 11.30 – 12.30
The Florence, 131-133 Dulwich Road, Herne Hill
Whether you have an allotment, small garden or just a windowsill, everyone can grow their own salad, herbs or veg.
Growing your own food can be fun, it tastes great and you will have a ready supply of fresh food. This hands on workshop run by a Garden Organic Master
Gardener will help you get started, plan your planting and you can sow some seeds in a pot to take away. There will be a question and answer session at the end.
All welcome – including children of all ages who can also sow their own seeds.
Places limited so to book your free place please email info@localgreens.org.uk.
The Florence is a lovely pub across from Brockwell Park and very near Herne Hill train station. http://www.capitalpubcompany.com/the-florence/
The Master Gardener programme is a volunteer led scheme managed by Garden Organic, the UK’s leading organic growing charity.
www.mastergardeners.org.uk

Posted:

We had an extended dig and sold biscuits for the Five Parks Walkers. But the truly exciting bit is that the bees have arrived! Seb and Caroline spent most of the day getting them settled in. Thanks for Neil for some last minute carpentry on the hive.

We did lots of weeding, particularly in the fruit beds, which were overgrown with grass, and watered the new seedlings. We planted some brassicas donated by Ram (thanks!). We planted some more lettuce. And Andrew and his son and daughter dug over one side of the polytunnel beds, and contributed some very delicious welsh cakes for the biscuit stall.

The phaecelia is in full bloom, just in time for the bees.

Posted: May 9, 2012

We’ll have an extended dig day on Sunday as we’re going to be the Ruskin Park checkpoint for the Five Parks Walk. There’s loads to do – planting seeds, digging over the new polytunnel beds, and weeding the fruit beds. We’ll also be selling biscuits to the walkers to raise money for seeds, etc so if you feel like baking please drop off your goodies at the garden at 12.

The Five Parks Walk is a lovely way to explore the area – http://madforbrockwellpark.com/2012/04/29/five-parks-walk-sunday-13-may/ so if you don’t have plans, do the walk and then stay in the community garden for some digging!

Posted: May 8, 2012

We had a fantastic day. The garden is definitely springing into spring, despite the weather. The flowers from last year’s Chelsea Flower Show Eden Project garden are flowering, as is the cherry tree that Cosmo rescued. The rhubarb is big, and the broad beans are even bigger.

We put up the screen to protect the beehive. It also will ensure that when the bees fly out they are above head height.The bees arrive this week! Seb has been doing training via Capital Bee and has an experienced mentor, Caroline. We will practice ‘natural’ or non-interventionist bee-keeping. The goal is to keep the bees alive, rather than harvesting honey.

Rochelle added comfrey leaves to water to make plant food. It will stew for a month or two in the shed (and make an atrocious smell). Then we can use it.

A local nursery had seedlings in need of a home, so there were lots of kids and parents planting. As we were a bit behind in our planting it was great to have the seedlings, and the kids had fun digging (and the parents, who were bemused by how deep potato trenches need to be).

We also planted broccoli and swede seeds, and did loads of weeding. And Seb and Kate made very yummy toffee and stem ginger cookies to keep us going. We harvested carrots, chicory, and chard.

Trees for Cities has lifted the turf on the area where the polytunnel will go. On Sunday we’ll dig it over and add compost, then they’ll put the polytunnel up. A very big thanks to Ben for all his help.

Posted: May 4, 2012

Nothing much to report this week. Two more posts for fruit nets were dug in, the scarecrow was righted after winds knocked it over. The ground is very wet.

Posted: May 1, 2012

Posted: April 20, 2012

April 28, 2 – 3.30pm
in the by the bandstand cafe on Clapham Common

This is the first of a series of five, one a month April – August which will lead to the harvest feasts in September in Myatt’s Fields, and the Incredible Edible AGM and feast at the Garden Museum in October. Each session will have three aspects:

– share your expertise on growing and tell us what you want to know
– explore opportunities to generate income from growing
– network with others involved in community growing

RSVP your attendance on http://projectdirt.com/group/incredibleediblelambeth. You can also contact us on incredibleediblelambeth@gmail.com, putting ‘workshops’ in the subject line.

On April 28th we’ll be looking at what to sow under three headings: what do the community gardeners want, what are good crops to sell, crops for winter storage.
Facilitator: Fiona Law (IEL member, South London Master Gardener Coordinator, Lambeth resident/grower, horticultural trainer)
Special guest: Natasha Soares, local growing coordinator with Herne Hill/Dulwich/East Dulwich veg box scheme, Local Greens

Posted:

Incredible Edible Lambeth and London Borough of Lambeth bring you a co-production:

The Great Clapham Common Compost Giveaway and Pumpkin Seed Sowing Event!

Saturday 28th April 2012
11 – 3 in the by the bandstand cafe on Clapham Common
(googlemaps)

– Bring a barrow, a bucket, a bag or a buggy and take away green waste compost made on Clapham Common – it’s free!
– Plant a pumpkin seed and find out about Incredibible Edible Lambeth’s harvest festival pumpkin competition in October – free again!
– Get gardening and compost advice from the South London Master Gardeners – free!
– Tell IEL and LBL what you need for growing and give your views on recycling food waste for compost

Please come along. It’s a great chance to get growing, meet other local people into growing, and find out about Incredible Edible Lambeth. This is for anyone and everyone – please spread the word!

(click here for more info)

Posted:

Sat 21st April (THIS COMING SAT) 11am – 1pm in the Picture Room in Brockwell Hall, Brockwell Park
Your chance to be part of creating the first ever cooperative community for community growing groups

As you know, the Lambeth Growing Hubs project aims to enable the 114 community gardening, food growing, horticultural and wildlife projects in Lambeth to work together to share skills and resources by creating three “Growing Hubs” (in Myatts Fields, in Brockwell Greenhouses and in Streatham Rookery). The Growing Hubs will be places where groups can access training, support and share skills. I’m really excited about this project: there is so much potential for the Lambeth Growing Hubs to be a vibrant co-operative community that will take the struggle out of community growing- simply by making cooperation easier.

Thanks so much for filling in the online questionnaire. This has given us a good idea about what training, support, and resources you (the growing groups) need and where we should be going with the Lambeth Growing Hubs project. However, there is nothing like face to face discussion for getting a really good idea of what the Lambeth Growing Hubs Project should be focusing on first.

On Saturday, we’ll be handing over to you to tell us what you would like the Lambeth Growing Hubs Project to do. I personally promise to make this a really fun participatory gathering of like minded people with lots of opportunities to network and share. The meeting will feature

Introduction to the Growing Hubs Project and to the Growing Hubs
What the online questionnaire has told us
Over to you: you tell us what the Lambeth Growing Hubs should be doing
Joint funding bids ideas shop
Networking lunch (again organic and yummy)

Any questions or concerns, please don’t hesitate to get in touch (my number and details are below). Otherwise, I look forward to seeing you on Saturday

All the best

Giovanna

P.S. Let me know if you’ll be there

Giovanna Speciale
Community and Education Project Officer
giovanna.speciale@groundwork.org.uk
Direct dial: 0208 687 4084
Mobile: 07948 431833

Posted:

We’ve been approached by Spacehive as a potential site for an outdoor kitchen. They say:

“We’re currently running an initiative to bring outdoor kitchens to London, creating fantastic social hubs for people to get together and share their cooking.

We have paired up two architectural practices with two pilot sites – Spitalfields City Farm and Newham City Farm. Each site will have a bespoke kitchen designed for them, which will then be fundrasied for via Spacehive, supported by the London Festival of Architecture.

As so many architects have been keen to work on this project we’re on the lookout for more sites, and thought Ruskin Park Community Garden could be a brilliant site, as the kitchen could tie in well with your growing activities.”

We’ve invited them to come see the garden, will keep you posted.

Outdoor kitchens brief short

Posted: April 4, 2012

A good day.

We did a good deal of watering, including the trees in the new orchard area beyond the one o’clock club. There was a fair bit of weeding to be done, as the unplanned additions to some of the beds have clearly been thriving in this unseasonable warm weather as well.

We cleared/weeded/dug over a couple of beds, and planted out several rows of onions (sets and seeds) and some spring onions in one bed, and 3 rows of black kale (cavolo nero) in another

The peas in the mandala bed are up and looking perky, the broad beans are in full riot, and lots of the perennials – the soft fruit and so on – are showing signs of coming back into leaf

Posted: March 25, 2012

We had a fantastic day at the garden, making scarecrows, planting seeds, weeding, and enjoying the Trees for Cities festivities – facepainting, crafts, and a roving Dixieland band. There were loads of kids in the garden helping with digging, planting, and watering, and families picnicking in the warm sunshine. We planted sunflowers, wild rocket, and peas by the fence, and loads of seeds in pots to sell at the Ruskin Park Summer Fete on June 23. We also started making supports for the raspberries from skipped timber.
‘Herb’ and ‘Barb’ are our new scarecrows. Herb is standing guard in the herb patch, and Barb is next to the rhubarb. We also hung up used CDs, all to discourage the local birds from using the veg as a snack bar.

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Brixton based not for profit company Embrace Cooperation Ltd is running a yearlong community project called ‘Lost Stories of Ruskin Park’. As part of Embrace’s project the organisation will be running five free nature walks in Ruskin Park. Everyone is welcome.

10am to 11.30am Thursday 29th March: Bird Walk
11am to 2pm Saturday 21st April: Wild Food Walk
10am to 11.30am Thursday 24th May: Plant ID Walk
7.45pm to 9pm Saturday 4th August: Bat Walk
1pm to 3pm Thursday 23rd August: Summer Tree ID Walk

If you’re interested in being interviewed, would like more information about the project or to book a place on any of the walks, phone John Cannell, Project Coordinator, on 020 7274 9450 or email john.c@myembrace.org. The project website is www.ruskinparkproject.wordpress.com.

Posted: March 17, 2012

We have lovely new neighbours — Trees for Cities has moved into the old 1 o’clock club building. They’re having a community event Saturday March 24. – a family focused day with a swing band playing, face painter, easter egg hunt, arts and craft activities and tree planting going on in the orchard area. It is all completely free and runs from 11am to 3pm. We will be making scarecrows in the community garden at the same time, please bring old clothes and hats to dress them.

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It wasn’t big, but we did dig. We got the best of the day’s weather – dry and overcast. Kate and Mark planted 1st early, 2nd early, and maincrop potatoes. Andrew planted broad beans and peas, with some help from Billy. I planted squash (crown prince, uchiki kuri, and marina di chioggia) and weeded. The £50 from Capital Growth bought us the seed potatoes, some seeds, and 8 new hand tools. It’s a really exciting time of year, planting seeds in anticipation of this year’s crop.

Posted: March 15, 2012

Come on down 3-5 Saturday to plant potatoes and seeds and eat chocolate brownies.

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Posted: March 12, 2012

Well what a glorious day in march it was for a dig day. For anyone who was not there with trowel or spade an opportunity was missed! With a slow start our numbers swelled to at least nine if not eleven volunteers and some passers by who seemed interested for future digs.
The beds are all looking very healthy and soil rich, they seem to be positively reaching out for us to lay some seeds down so that we did with enthusiasm, in went some peas and some impressive cane structures to support their future growth, some jerusalem artichokes, dill, peppermint and even rocket. However some of the beds have not been behaving so well and had let the grass creep in right under their noses so a few toiled away with that thankless yet aesthetically pleasing task of getting the weeds out and one volunteer even took such care that he removed one blade at a time! Also the sprouts were ousted and the bed sieved and border relayed for the…parsnips and chard i believe.
We harvested some of the few remaining carrots which are still tasting lovely and the smell of thyme and lemon thyme could not be escaped once harvested from the herb bed.
All in all a successful day and sadly no pictures taken by me but have a look for yourself on saturdays dig. [pictures now!]

Posted: March 10, 2012

Capital Growth has organised a London-wide day for digging! We’ll have a dig day 3-5pm. We’ll be planting veg seeds. We should have plenty of new volunteers, so please do come down to help show them around, get them started, etc.

They say:

Big Dig is a volunteering event that aims to encourage Londoners to get their hands dirty at their local community growing space.

Capital Growth is hoping to mobilise thousands of volunteers across London to help community food-growing spaces prepare for the new growing season. Volunteers will only be required to help for one day but we hope some will choose to stay involved throughout the growing season.

Posted: February 26, 2012

Work in the garden today included a tidy-up around the shed. We dug out compost from the large bin and spread it over some of the beds; a bit of weeding round the beans; watering; raking leaves. Harvested some carrots and cabbage from the front bed. We notice that the top corner of the plot (by the compost) is very damp. This seems to suggest there might be water running underground somewhere near by. If we’re planning to dig a pond in that area it will be interesting to see if the hole fills on its own – if so, hopefully it’s good water. Interesting wildlife spotted today: common frog disturbed from its hibernation as we dug the compost, robin and blackbird enjoying the freshly turned beds.

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Posted: February 25, 2012

It was a glorious early spring day, warm and sunshiney. We planted lots of tomatoes, and also peas and sunflowers.
We did lots of weeding, watered the peas and washed down the glass windows that form their coldframe, and put compost in some of the beds that aren’t draining well.
The broad beans are looking good.

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Trees for Cities is moving into the old 1 O’clock Club, next to the community garden. They are having a consultation Thursday, March 1, 2:30-5:00pm. Come meet them there and ask them about their plans.

Posted: February 16, 2012

We’ve had two dry winters and reservoirs are below the levels they should be. It’s time to think about saving water. Saving water reduces carbon output as well, as purifying water takes a lot of energy, and if you’re using less hot water you’re heating less water.
Here’s some good general water saving tips:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/2945018.stm
And here’s some that are more energy oriented:
http://www.energysavingtrust.org.uk/In-your-home/Water

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Can you help people grow their own food? Become a South London Master Gardener.
Master Gardeners volunteer 30 hours a year offering food growing advice and support to residents and Lambeth and other boroughs.

free two-day foundation training 21st and 22nd April 2012
active support and ongoing training from your local volunteer co-ordinator; part of volunteer network
help local households and wider community by events/workshops

Please visit www.southlondon.mastergardeners.org.uk
contact the volunteer co-ordinator, Fiona Law, flaw@gardenorganic.org.uk, 07584 343847

Posted: January 26, 2012

The new 2012 Capital Growth urban food growing calendar is now available. Check out http://www.capitalgrowth.org/training/ to see the wide range of food growing training on offer at the Capital Growth allotment in The Regents Park.
Ruskin Park volunteers get a discount, our space number is 369.

Posted: January 16, 2012

It was really lovely to be back in the garden yesterday. The sun was shining and it was crisp but not too cold.
We did a bit of weeding but the ground was too frozen in places. We raked and composted the leaves, picked up rubbish that had blown in, and fixed the tilting sign. Neil made an impressive cold frame for the peas, and we netted the beetroot. There was a very territorial robin puffing himself up on the veg cloche, as we were clearly invading his territory. The broad beans are 6″ high in places, and the onions have made a good start now that the chicken wire keeps the squirrels from digging them up.
We had a fairly bountiful harvest, for January. Beetroot, cavolo nero, parsley, parsnip, and the best carrots I have ever tasted.
Kate is working on the planting plan, based on our crop rotation plan, what has thrived and hasn’t in the past, what people like, and the input we had from our planting plan dig day in the autumn. Next month we’ll need to start our tomato seeds indoors.
Next dig day: Sunday January 29th 1-3pm.

Posted: January 10, 2012

Come along Sunday to weed, water, and start to get ready for spring.

Posted: December 26, 2011

We had a fantastic day planting the edible hedge. Loads of happy, energetic diggers building a hedge that will provide food for people and animals for years to come. Well done to Doug Gillies from Friends of Ruskin Park for organising it, Jackie and Mark from RPCG for being orchard leaders, David Blair from the London Orchard Project for leading it, and all the volunteers who made it happen.

Posted: December 8, 2011

A friend sent me this inspiring blog post http://www.thehubble.net/2011/12/08/growing-community/ about the positive effect growing veg and flowers can have on a neighbourhood.

Posted: December 7, 2011

Special Dig Day
We’ll plant up the new edible hedgerow along the fence in the orchard area. Please try to come along, we’ll need lots of diggers and planters. Plant list: Blackthorn, Hawthorn, Elder, Raspberry, Loganberry, Tayberry, Gooseberry, Redcurrant, Medlar, Crab apple, Plums, Cob nuts.  Bring gloves and a spade if you have them. Brownies provided

Salvation Army Community Christmas Carols, 2-3pm at the bandstand.
The annual event at the bandstand when the community come together for Christmas carols. Refreshments will be served to keep you warm.

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Want to start a new growing space? Get some funding from Capital Growth.
Capital Growth Funding

Grants round launched to support community food-growing projects in London

If you are planning to start a community food-growing space or want to expand an existing space and you are looking for money to buy soil, seeds, tools and other materials necessary, this is your opportunity to apply for some financial support!
For more information, including the application criteria, and to complete an application form please visit http://www.capitalgrowth.org/apply/
Grants are available from £150 up to £750.

Grants round deadline: 5pm, 16th January 2012

Also, don’t miss our Winter networking event on Tue, 13th Dec from 1-4pm. For more info and to book go to http://www.capitalgrowth.org/events/networkingevents.

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We weeded a fair amount, cleared the beans/corn/squash bed, replanted the onions (dug up by the squirrels) and put chicken wire on them, netted the chard (chomped by the birds).

The last of the summer’s green beans

Left: the squirrels dug up the onions. They don’t eat them, they just seem intent on vandalism. Right: replanted and hopefully thwarting the squirrels with chickenwire.

The harvest – beans, carrots, and beetroot.

We put netting on the chard, which has been decimated by birds. it should recover nicely and last all winter.

Posted: November 26, 2011

Hope to see you at the garden tomorrow 1-3pm. We’ll weed, net, and maybe build more plant supports.

Posted: November 18, 2011

Next dig day: Sunday Nov 27 1-3pm

We had a productive day at the garden on Sunday. It was oddly warm and sunny, more like September. Cosmo and Neil built another support structure from recycled timber. We weeded the front bed and added compost to improve the drainage. We cleared the tomatoes from the front planter and planted onions in it.

The phacelia is growing very well. We’ll let it die down naturally. Here’s more about it: http://www.greenmanure.co.uk/phacelia.htm

Posted: November 9, 2011

Posted: November 4, 2011

We’re going to dig days every other week now, as the growing season slows down.

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We are Capital Growth space 369.
The following courses take place in The Regent’s Park Allotment Garden. They cost £10 for Capital Growth spaces (£20 for others). To book email training@capitalgrowth.org or visit
www.capitalgrowth.org/training/the_regents_park/
Permaculture Design Taster
Sat 12 November OR Sat 3 December, 10.30am – 1pm

Soft Fruits, Tree Pruning and Care
Sat 26 November, 10.30am – 1pm

The following will take place at London Wildlife Trust Centre for Wildlife Gardening. Cost is £10 for Capital Growth spaces (£20 for others).To book call 020 7252 9186 or email Lucy: lritchie@wildlondon.org.uk.
Wildlife Gardening workshop – an inspirational workshop delivered by Elaine Hughes.
13 November 10.30am-1.30pm

The following will take place at Hammersmith Community Garden Association @ Phoenix Farm. Cost is £10 for Capital Growth spaces (£15 for others).To book email adminhcga@gmail.com

Soft Fruit and Fruit Tree Pruning and Care
Sat 19 November, 10am – 1pm.

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From Cosmo:
Well well, as the garden slows down for winter the leaves falling on the grass certainly do not. A slow start on sunday but with the help of some willing newcomers, two of whom were first timers which is great to see, we had a productive afternoon of digging, sieving, raking and then planting some peas so they can make a head start for spring. A good sign of the time that the gardens have been occupied by green fingered volunteers but sadly not for the picnic bench is the state of one of the covers. Maybe a winter bake off is in order!
Not much else to report as the growth of the greens, purples and browns have slowed but look forward to more netting structure for next spring.

Posted: October 27, 2011

Last Sunday Neil and Timo built a very impressive veg support structure from recycled timber. We’ve used it to shelter the cavolo nero and cabbage from the voracious pigeons. They’ve decimated the beetroot. We’ve now netted the beetroot, hopefully it will make a comeback. It looks like they’ve decided the garden is their favorite cafe, so we’ll have to be resolute in our netting. The birds damaged the swede beyond repair. They don’t seem to like carrot tops or lettuce though. Andrew gave everything a much needed drink, and Jacqui and Esme weeded. We also planted the overwintering broad beans.

This coming Sunday we’ll weed some more, plant some overwintering peas, and start work on another support structure. After that we’ll go to fortnightly dig days.

Please note the new time: 1-3pm.

Posted: October 22, 2011

The London Orchard Project will be planting fruit and nut trees in the area between the pond and the 1 o’clock club. We need a few people to volunteer to look after the trees while they get established – this mostly means watering once a week. Please email info@ruskinparkcommunitygarden.org if you would like to get involved.

Orchard Leader training will take place on Sunday 27th November at Myatts Fields, SE5 9RA (times tbc but will be a full-day event).

The morning session will focus on fruit tree planting and maintenance, including starting to write up an orchard management plan. In the afternoon we’ll look at community engagement. We train around 4 people per site as Orchard Leaders. They will be primarily responsible for the orchard and its maintenance, and will pass on their knowledge to others in the community, getting others involved in the planting day, watering rota etc.

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Two workshops organised by Lambeth Green and Sustainable Communities programme, funded by Skills Funding Agency

Learn to make chutney and preserves

Monday October 31, 2011 from 1pm to 3pm
Clapham Park Community Resource Centre,
SW4, corner of Headlam Road and Kings Avenue
http://projectdirt.com/events/learn-to-make-chutney-and-preserves

Get your community project started in 2012

Tuesday 1st December, from 1pm to 3pm
Green Man Skills Centre, Coldharbour Lane
http://projectdirt.com/events/how-to-start-a-green-community

Saturday 29th October – DraughtBusting Session from 11 am onwards. Do you want to save energy in your home? Transition Brockley is offering the opportunity to learn how to install some basic home insulation.

Drop in between 11am and 1pm to see a demo (in a private house on Hilly Fields) of how to draughtproof doors and windows easily and neatly. Then buy the materials and – DIY!

LOCATION: 22 Eastern Road, SE4

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Thursday 17 November 7.30pm, at Cafe Crema, New Cross Road:

The Mysterious Bee – an instructive documentary about one man’s fascination with the bees he’s keeping in his back garden.

See here for some info: www.wildfilmhistory.org/film/424/The+Mysterious+Bee.html

Also, a five minute clip on YouTube:
www.youtube.com/watch?v=ap4jEtd0S8M

£3 charge at the door.

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We’ll be planting the overwintering broad beans and making a start on building support structures for the plants and netting. We have some timber taken out when someone did their loft; we’ll build box shaped frames that we can hang netting on, or use for vertical support for tomatoes, beans, peas, etc.

Kate took these pictures of support structures at a garden in Paris.

Posted: October 16, 2011

Enjoy the glorious autumn sunshine, and get the garden ready for winter.
Last weekend we chose what the plant for next year. We’re going to try salsify and scorzonera, but no brassicas. Lots more winter squash and some heirloom courgette varieties. We’ll be planting overwintering broad beans and peas in the next few weeks. Kate is updating the planting plan based on the veg we chose and the crop rotation plan.

Posted: October 6, 2011

Please come along Sunday with your ideas about what veg we should grow. We’ll use the crop rotation plan and what has worked well in the past as a starting point to decide what we’re going to grow next year. I’ve got a pile of seed catalogues to get inspiration from.

Posted: October 5, 2011

Please email education@oasisplay.org.uk to book a place.

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The Garden Museum is celebrating food growing in Lambeth this weekend and that all community gardeners get free access to the Museum on Saturday, and their new exhibition ‘From Garden City to Green City’. http://www.gardenmuseum.org.uk/

Posted: October 2, 2011

Good work on the garden today despite few hands. We dug some compost into the Mandala beds, gave them a good watering and planted spinach, radishes, and something else (can’t remember). The last of the Jerusalem Artichoke were harvested, and the nearby tomatoes cleared. We also dug out the dead courgette plants. All the beds have been watered – so hopefully that’ll see them through the next couple of hot days before rain arrives mid-week, if forecasts are correct.

Posted: September 27, 2011

It was a glorious autumn afternoon with good food, good company, and good music. We could hear the strains of the orchestra playing at the bandstand. As well as the lovely regulars we had a steady stream of people who’d never been to the garden – hospital patients, passersby, concertgoers, and the folks attending the Green Flag raising. There was plenty of yummy food to go around, prepared by garden volunteers from what we’ve grown. And we had puddings made from local ingredients, and even wine made from Lambeth grapes! Towards the end Seb got out his ukelele, and Andrew went home and got his accordion and a big tub of percussion instruments for the kids, and we had a sing a long in the setting sun. A fantastic time was had by all.
Big thanks to Cosmo and the other strimmers – the garden looked vastly better. And to Meloni for her gorgeous poster drawing. And to Jean for her camping stove and picnicware. And to Seb and Andrew for the music. And to Lara for helping out and opening up the kitchen so we could wash dishes. And to Meloni and Neil for washing dishes. And to everyone who brought something to share.

Posted: September 16, 2011

On Sunday we’ll be harvesting in preparation for the Harvest Feast on Saturday Sept 24. If you’d like to make a dish for the feast, please come along and take some veg home with you.
We’ll also be weeding, tidying up, and planting.

Posted: September 15, 2011

It was a glorious early autumn day at the garden. We sieved the rest of the brassica bed and planted vetch, and did quite a lot of weeding. The phacelia and crimson clover are already coming up in the other beds. We harvested beans, lettuce, tomatoes. We also harvested almonds from the orchard to serve at the harvest feast. And more crabapples. We propped up the beans, which had pulled over the sweetcorn. We have a few heads of sweetcorn but decided it’s just not worth growing it.

Posted: September 9, 2011

Sunday’s dig: 3-5pm. We’ll plant more green manure, weed, and harvest. Hope to see you there.

Date for your diary: Saturday, September 24, 3-6 pm will be the Harvest Feast. Everyone is invited – regulars, people who haven’t been in ages, people who have never been. We’re going to harvest the week before, and people who want to make a dish for the feast will take veg home. Puddings made from local food are also very welcome.

Speaking of local food, it’s the perfect time of year to go scrumping – harvesting apples or other fruit from trees that aren’t yours. My neighbour has a tree laden with apples that he doesn’t harvest; I’m going to ask him if I can pick them to make a harvest feast pudding.

The harvest feast coincides with the last bandstand concert of the year. The concert finishes at 4pm so everyone is invited to bring an instrument to continue the music. I’ve heard rumours of a ukulele.

Meloni did a beautiful drawing for the harvest feast poster; Kate is printing and laminating them and will bring them on Sunday so we can distribute them to people who want to put them up.

The steering committee met this week (the steering committee is comprised of 7 regulars, if you’re interested in joining please let me know). We talked through the harvest feast, the wildlife area, next year’s planting plan, and reviewed our finances.

Cosmo has done a lovely design for the wildlife area. The funding and labour for the hedge will come from the Maudsley. I’m hoping to get this going in the next few weeks.

On the October 9th dig day we’re going to do next year’s planting plan as a group, so come along with suggestions of what to grow. We’ll also take into account the crop rotation plan and what did and didn’t do well this year.

Once the planting and weeding activities slow down we’ll use dig days to create support structures for netting, tomatoes, beans, etc. We’ll continue to have weekly dig days until we run out of things to do. When the days get shorter we’ll have to move the time back to 1-3pm.

We don’t have anywhere near enough money for a greenhouse (we need about £1500 to buy a polycarbonate greenhouse, can’t do glass). The cloche worked acceptably well last year, we’ll use it again this year and continue to look for funding for the greenhouse. We are going to buy a strimmer; we desperately need it. We’re also going to spend money on more netting, stakes, and gloves.

Posted: September 4, 2011

After a murky start we had a lovely sunny afternoon at the garden and got loads done. We weeded the potato bed, dug up the ‘volunteer’ jerusalem artichokes that were in the pea bed and weeded that bed, and cleared some of the failed brassicas and weeded that bed. We planted phacelia in the potato bed and crimson clover in the pea bed. We tidied the brussels sprouts. Here’s the lovely weed-free bed with the phacelia planted.

We harvested tomatoes, peas, courgettes, lettuce, and beetroot and everyone went home with a big pile of veg. Many people also took a bag of crabapples to have a go at jelly making.

Posted: September 2, 2011

Sunday we’ll plant some green manure. We have three kinds – vetches (winter tares), phacelia, and crimson clover. A green manure is a crop that improves the soil in some way, but isn’t harvested for eating. The soil can be improved by fixing nitrogen, by keeping weeds down and prevent erosion, by breaking up heavy soils, and many other ways. There’s quite a lot of info on http://www.greenmanure.co.uk/sow_help.htm

There should be loads to harvest as well, and always weeds to defeat.

Posted: August 28, 2011

We had a surprisingly dry and sunny afternoon at the garden. It was perfect weeding weather – the soil was damp so even the deepest taproots came out in one piece. We weeded the carrots, the mandala bed, and the (former) potato bed. We propped up the corn, which was getting pulled over by the beans in the 3 Sisters. And we harvested beans, tomatoes, courgettes, and chard.The corn should be ready quite soon.

We will have loads for the harvest feast – carrots, jerusalem artichokes, beans, tomatoes, lettuce, beetroot, turnips, chard, pattypan squash and maybe winter squash.

The crabapples are ready and I’ve had a go making crabapple jelly http://www.waitrose.com/home/recipes/recipe_directory/c/crab_apple_jelly.html. The trees are over-laden with crabapples so feel free to harvest as many as you like.

Posted: August 26, 2011

The Friends of Ruskin Park are working with the London Orchard Project to plant up to 10 new fruit trees in the area between the pond and the 1 o’clock club. They are looking for volunteers to help with planting (in Dec-Feb) and watering. Please get in touch – friendsofruskinpark@gmail.com if you’re interested.

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Come along Sunday for some digging, harvesting, and weeding. The purple climbing beans are ready and we’ll have a look at the jerusalem artichokes as they may be ready too.

Posted: August 23, 2011

If you’re in the Myatt’s Field area soon, it’s worth a detour to have a look at the Patmos Area Community Conservation Association (Pacca TMO) http://www.pacca.co.uk/ planting. I’ve included some pictures here. It’s at the junction of Patmos Road and Lothian Road in SE5.

Truly inspiring!

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The garden is looking great overflowing with interesting colours of almost ripe vegetables. The mandala bed was weeded and then some selective weeding of other beds followed. Then we set about turning and sieveing the soil of the small bed near one oclock club ready for planting next week in which we found some more potatoes which must have escaped he last dig. We all looked up in awe of the giant nine foot tall artichokes and wondered how much taller they can become. Then a little harvesting of some of Tue sweetest cherry toms I’ve ever tasted, some delicious green beans and superb looking beetroot which I later made into a risotto using the stalks as well. Then trimmed some of the herbs to allow regrowth and left the garden basking in glorious august sunshine.

Ps. Does anyone know how tall Jerusalem artichokes are meant to be before harvesting?

Posted: August 17, 2011

Apologies for the radio silence…

Dig day Sunday 3-5, all welcome!

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Capital Growth has organised a course to preserve the season’s gluts. We’re a Capital Growth space, so all welcome to sign up.

Capital Growers come along and learn how to preserve the fruits of your labour at the Capital Growth ‘Pop up Pickle!’ Chefs from The Table Cafe in Southwark will guide us through making chutneys and jams from London grown produce.

When: Monday 5th September, 18.30 – 21.00.

Where: The Table Cafe, 83 Southwark Street. SE1 0HX http://thetablecafe.com/

How much: £10 and as much produce that you can pick! (We ask a minimum of 2KG of any fruit or veg). We will give The Table chefs a couple of jars from each project for them to use on their menu as well!

What we provide: A commercial kitchen, jars, labels and hands on professional advice from chefs.

Suggested Fruit: Plums, berries, apples, pears (if they are ready).
Suggested vegetables for pickles/chutneys: tomatoes, onions, carrots, beetroot, courguettes, cucumber, squashes, aubergines, apples.

Top Tip: Pick plums and berries now and freeze them – remember to take any stones out before you freeze!

The preserves will be produced in a commercial kitchen, you will get back jars according to the amount of fruit you bring (minus few jars we will offer to the Table to sell) We will also help you with labelling them. This will make it easily possible for you to sell them at your convenience!

Contact: eloise@sustainweb.org or spaces@capitalgrowth.org to book your space.

Posted: August 2, 2011

Posted: August 1, 2011

Yesterday was sunny and peaceful at the garden. We did lots of watering, dug up the rest of the potatoes and a quite a few lettuces, and weeded a bit. Roger got the strimmer engine started but it cut out whenever he revved it to actually start strimming. Thankfully the sellers will take it back for a full refund.

The garden is looking very bountiful, aside from some sad brassicas. The kale and broccoli are not thriving at all, and I’m not sure why. The kale is stunted and has yellowing leaves, and the broccoli is bolting. I’ve found this page http://www.co.missoula.mt.us/extension/plantdata/PLANTS/kale/index.html and I’ll have another look. It’s definitely not a nitrogen deficiency because we had beans in the plot last year.  Plants can be very specific about what location they do well in; the purple cabbages near the path aren’t nearly as happy as the purple cabbage that found its way into the herb bed in the back.

The three sisters are doing very well.  The corn supports the beans, the beans feed nitrogen to the squash, and the squash keeps the soil moist and weed free.

We had a big harvest – potatoes, oversize courgettes, lettuce, pattypan squash, a handful of tomatoes, and 5 gooseberries. It is so satisfying to eat what you’ve grown! I made curried courgette and potato soup and salad for dinner last night.

Posted: July 24, 2011

Only four of us at the garden today. We did a bit of weeding and tidying up the borders, cutting the grass a bit, and some watering. The courgettes are growing quickly at the moment. We picked a few of the bigger ones. And we dug some potatoes too – actually rather too many, so there’s a bunch of them in the shed if anyone wants to collect a few during the week.

Posted: July 22, 2011

Sunday will be perfect weeding conditions – warm and sunny with moist soil so the weeds will come up easily and in one piece. The weeds will have been making good headway with all the rain. I’m sure there will be loads to harvest as well. All welcome 3-5pm.

Last week several hearty souls braved the downpour to do some digging, and tried to strim. Sadly we’ve not been able to get the strimmer to work (the downside of buying used items without manuals on ebay). The seller has promised to show us how to start it next week.

Posted: July 10, 2011

We had a lovely productive day. The garden is looking abundant and healthy. We planted up the mandala bed – carrots, onions, endive, and cabbage. We cleared the bolted spinach and rocket and planted beetroot. We gathered nettles and put them in water to make a fertiliser. We harvested potatoes, broadbeans, peas, turnip, and garlic. We trimmed the grass and planted more of the flowers in the wildlife area. We tidied up the brassicas and built higher netting cages around them. And we weeded. Tom brought some bricks so we were able to finish off the mandala; it is looking great.

Posted: July 8, 2011

Sunday looks to be a nice day. We’ll plant some seeds in the mandala bed, do some weeding and watering. Please bring used bricks if you have any so we can finish the paths.

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We had a very good day on Sunday, lots of diggers and lots of digging. We finished sieving the mandala bed, dug in some compost, put brick paths down, and planted up the swede seedlings and some of the herbs from the B&Q Chelsea Flower Show garden. We had another big broad bean harvest and also got some curly carrots and turnips.

We could use some more used bricks if anyone passes a skip with them in it. We also really need a strimmer. If anyone has a petrol strimmer to donate or sell (cheap), or can recommend where to get one, please get in touch.

Posted: June 29, 2011

We had a busy weekend. We raised £156 selling plants at the Ruskin Park Summer Fete, which takes us a big step closer to a greenhouse, and many seeds got a start in life at the seed planting stall. We also signed up a bunch of new people to the newsletter, hopefully they’ll we’ll see them at a dig day soon.

We weeded (again) and worked on the compost area – we’ve started moving the palette crates that the plants came into position against the fence. We insulated and filled one of them with the manure from the stables, the food waste compost, and our own green waste. We had another big harvest of broad beans, and some potatoes.

Next dig day: Sunday 3-5pm.

Posted: June 21, 2011

It’s big weekend at the park and garden. Saturday is the Ruskin Park Summer Fete – 1-4pm at the bandstand. There are lots of great activities on offer. We’ll be running a seed planting stall, as well as selling the remaining flowers and herbs from the Chelsea B&Q garden to raise money for the greenhouse.
We’ll have dig days Saturday and Sunday:
Saturday 1-4pm
Sunday 3-5pm
Hope to see you there!

Posted:

We had a lovely productive afternoon at our new 3-5pm time, including some bright sunshine. Cosmo and Roger made a start on the wildlife area, planting up some of the bee-friendly flowers from the Chelsea B&Q garden. Dan, a new volunteer, started sieving the mandala bed. He said it was like a jigsaw puzzle, e.g. once he finished one section he wanted to keep going on a new section. James planted carrots and weeded a lot. Meloni planted squash and beetroot and weeded a lot. Neil made another of his super structures for netting. We saw the first cabbage white butterfly of the year. They particularly like brassicas, and can do a lot of damage, so we keep them off using netting. I planted some cabbage and swede, so we’ll have something to harvest come winter. B from Moorlands Estate Community Garden came for a chat and got dug into the wildlife area. We had a huge harvest, particularly of broadbeans. We also had turnips, which can be a bit of a conundrum in the kitchen. Here’s a delicious recipe I found http://www.epicurious.com/recipes/food/views/Turnip-Gratin-240249

Posted: June 17, 2011

We’re going to try a new, later time this week based on the survey feedback.
Sunday looks to be sunny and warm. We’ll be working on the new bed, weeding, and planting.

Posted: June 15, 2011

It was truly wet on Sunday but we had a few hearty diggers. We did a fair amount of weeding, thinned the brassicas, moved the marigolds, took out the spent pea plants, and updated the notebook with what has been planted and what needs doing. We went home with piles of broadbeans, peas, and lettuce.

Posted: June 10, 2011

Sunday we’ll be working on the new mandala (round) shaped bed. The shape is a permaculture concept: “In a nutshell, it is a circular garden divided by walk-through paths and keyholes which divide it into segments – like an apple pie that has been cut into equal parts.” The idea is that you can get to all areas of the bed without stepping on the soil. And it looks good.

After the rain we’ve had (hooray!) the weeds will be growing like mad so plenty of weeding to do as well.

Posted: June 2, 2011

Sunday looks to be warm and sunny so come along and get your fingers dirty! We need to plant the last of the seeds and seedlings, stake the raspberries, weed, water, and pot up plants.

We have a plant bonanza! B&Q turned up with three cubic metres of plants on Wednesday – thyme, basil, sage, and oregano, and lots of bee-friendly flowers. We’ll use what we can, and pot the rest up to sell at the Ruskin Park Summer Fete… that will definitely get us closer to buying a greenhouse!

Posted: May 30, 2011

We had a lovely productive afternoon in the garden. We planted the two apple and one cherry tree that we were given.

The demonstration area is looking much improved. We harvested the onions (here they are hanging up in our shed!) and planted out the red cabbage. We also put up some bean supports and planted some climbing beans.  We netted the red cabbage and the cavolo nero to keep the cabbage whites from infesting them with caterpillars! We planted some beetroot in one of the wheelchair height beds and gave the salad a much needed haircut. We also planted rocket, spinach, and chard.

We harvested radishes, onions, garlic, peas, broadbeans, and salad.

Posted: May 27, 2011

If you’re around this weekend, please do come down on Sunday. There is so much to do! We need to finish preparing the new round bed, stake the raspberries, weed, net, plant out last of the seedlings, and think about what to do in the demonstration beds (the ones by the path). We have three new fruit trees that were given to us as a thank you for the write up in Gardening Answers magazine, we need to decide where to plant them and then put them in. The garden is thriving despite the wind and lack of rain, well done to the waterers. We should have lots of peas, broad beans and salad to harvest. And possibly the first of the raspberries.

Great news – through a Capital Growth contest we won a portion of B&Q’s edible garden from Chelsea Flower Show. They will be delivering it on Sunday or Monday. Loads of herbs, veg, and bug boxes.

We sadly didn’t get the greenhouse funding we applied for through the Timberland Earthkeepers grant. But we have until next spring to find some funding, and we did pretty darn well raising seedlings with our small cloche and on our windowsills.

We met with the Maudsley hospital this week. We’re going to start having weekday sessions for patients in late August, focusing on the wildlife area hedge.

We also met with the Green Flag judges who were assessing Ruskin Park. They asked lots of questions and seemed pleased with our garden.

Posted: May 22, 2011

The weather was pretty changeable today but the sun came out and we got quite a bit done, mostly planting: cauliflower, celery, some more carrots, rocket, spinach and courgettes.

The the tomatoes will need stakes soon – we’ve propped up the larger ones.

The beans still seem to be suffering a bit from black fly.

We harvested some beans, peas, lettuce, and one or two of the onions that were going to seed.

Posted: May 17, 2011

Sunday’s dig was fun and festive as the Five Parks Walk walkers came through to have their books stamped. We raised £62, big thanks to Meloni and Kate for running the cake stand and to Jean, Kate and Meloni for homemade treats. The shed is happily installed on its very-well-built base and the tools and seeds are safe and dry! We planted out some seedlings, netted the calabrese to stop the birds from decimating it, and weeded the brussels sprouts. Everyone took home peas, broad beans, and lettuce.
Lots of walkers came through the garden to have a look, and some of them will definitely come back for dig days.

This Sunday’s dig is 1-3pm. There is lots of planting to do, as well as weeding, watering, and netting. Seb will be putting a coat of linseed oil and beeswax on the beehive, and will be around to talk through how the hive works. Now we’re just waiting on a swarm!