Category Archives: Orchards

Local Food Links Meeting

Posted on January 12, 2011 | Leave a comment

Local Food Links

Tuesday 25th January from 7-9pm

Portobello Community Centre

At the last Local Food Links get together we talked about what we wanted to to achieve in a years time…now we want to get things moving!

We want to bring together as many people as pos­sible who have been involved in PEDAL’s food pro­jects,  and people who are inter­ested in local food but haven’t yet man­aged to get involved.  Folk will be able to choose the topic they’re most keen on and work with oth­ers to plan what can be done over the next year.

There are exist­ing pro­jects like Fruitful Porty or the Portobello Organic Market, which has been incred­ibly suc­cess­ful, but is only fun­ded until the end of March, so it needs volun­teers if it is to con­tinue being the great com­munity event it is.  As well as ideas for new pro­jects rais­ing local food aware­ness or set­ting up a com­munity shop.

So, if you are inter­ested in the future of local food in Portobello, come along!

We hope to see you there!

For more inform­a­tion on the first local food links meet­ing see our earlier post­ing and food page

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Posted in Food, gardening, Market, Orchards, PEDAL, Volunteering

Winter Solstice celebration bonfire warms the cockles

Posted on December 8, 2010 | Leave a comment

On Saturday 18th of December, 2 — 4pm, PEDAL held a Winter Solstice Celebration at Donkeyfield Community Orchard. Around 40 people came along to cel­eb­rate this most sea­sonal of events, includ­ing sev­eral folk who had never been to the orch­ard before — not bad for sub-zero tem­per­at­ures. The trees were was­sailed in fine fash­ion (thanks to Gordon for the local cider, and Mairi for the song from the Winter’s Night con­cert), Peter brewed up some fine mulled wine and cre­ated a fant­ast­ic­ally warm­ing fire, Beth told a great story and some lovely lan­terns were made.

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Posted in Community, Orchards

Apple Day feedback — how was it for you??!

Posted on November 2, 2010 | Leave a comment

We had a won­der­ful Apple Day/ Halloween cel­eb­ra­tion on Saturday 30th of October, with near per­fect weather, a bon­fire, many pounds of apples being juiced, tof­fee apples, peel­ing com­pet­i­tion, Splat the Rotten Apple and folk turn­ing up in won­der­ful fancy dress. Many thanks to all who came and to all who helped.

However, if you were there, we’d be very pleased if you would take a moment to send us your com­ments and feed­back. What did you like ? What would have made it bet­ter? Are you likely to join in future com­munity events at the orch­ard? Woteva! — we look for­ward to hear­ing from you.

Please send com­ments to: info [at] pedal-porty [dot] org [dot] uk

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Posted in Orchards

Order your low-cost fruit trees now!

Posted on September 18, 2010 | Leave a comment

The Fruitful Porty scheme lets you order apple, pear, plum and cherry trees at sub­sid­ised prices through PEDAL. Download the fruit tree list and order now (or order online).

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Posted in Food, gardening, Orchards

Federation of City Farms & Community Gardens National Networking Day

Posted on September 7, 2010 | Leave a comment

The Federation of City Farms and Community Gardens are hav­ing their National Networking Event on Friday, October 8th 2010 at Battleby, near Perth.

Workshops include New Allotments; a look at dif­fer­ent allot­ments mod­els, Livestock on Community Gardens, Social Return on Investment, Selling Produce at Farmers Markets, Orchards, Wildlife Gardening in Winter, Community Gardening and the 2011 Elections, Risk Management and more!

There will be a chance to meet fun­ders, find out about bee­keep­ing, Care Farming, Planning Aid Scotland and hear case stud­ies from other pro­jects. It’s a great oppor­tun­ity to net­work, meet like-minded people and share ideas.

For fur­ther inform­a­tion please con­tact naomi [at] farmgarden [dot] org [dot] uk Tel: 0131 623 7058 Deadline for applic­a­tions is Friday 16th September 2010.

You can down load book­ing forms at  http://www.farmgarden.org.uk/farms-gardens/your-region/scotland/506-news-a-events

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Posted in events, Food, gardening, Land Reform, Orchards

Summer Pruning course

Posted on July 19, 2010 | 1 Comment

Many folk would like to gain con­fid­ence in prun­ing fruit trees and fruit bushes. The Summer Pruning course to be run at the Community Orchard off Brunstane Road South on the even­ing (6.30pm-8.30pm) of Thursday 19th of August is for those who want to learn how to get the most from their fruit trees etc by judi­cious prun­ing. Contact Peter Upton or Polly Cooke if you’d like to register for this one-off even­ing course. There’ll be a book­ing fee of £10 to reserve your place, though there’ll be no fur­ther cost.

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Posted in events, Food, gardening, Orchards

PEDAL Growing & Gardening Fair — THIS SATURDAY!

Posted on July 9, 2010 | 1 Comment

Saturday 7th August 2010

Portobello Town Hall

11am to 4pm

Experts Question Time at 2.30pm

As part of PEDAL’s Food pro­jects for 2010, we are hav­ing a Growing & Gardening Fair at the Town Hall.  Come along to this FREE event and find out more about grow­ing your own fruit & veget­ables, com­post­ing and more!

Stalls and advice to get you star­ted or help you out of a rut, plus Experts Question Time at 2.30pm.

Tea & Cakes!

There will be stalls on com­post­ing, inform­a­tion about organic food, PEDAL food pro­jects, PEDAL Energy Projects and oth­ers. If you’ve ever wondered what the Guerilla Gardeners are up to behind the town hall, they will be there to tell you all about it.  Members of the Orchard Group will also be on hand to talk about the Donkeyfield com­munity orch­ard on Brunstane Road, and tell you how you can get involved.

For those of you who are really addicted to veg­gies there will be a crafty corner where you can learn to knit your own veget­able accessories!

Then at 2:30 our panel of experts will take to the stage to answer your ques­tions.  Questions will be chosen from those pos­ted on the ques­tion board thoughout the day.

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Posted in Composting, events, Food, Orchards

Donkey Field Community Orchard Midsummer Celebration

Posted on June 8, 2010 | Leave a comment

Poster for Orchard Midsummer CelebrationSaturday 19 June from 6 pm.

Everyone is wel­come to come to the party; please just bring yourselves, food to share and some­thing to drink, wash­able cup, plate etc, plus a musical instru­ment if you play.  Feel free to bring a bar­be­cue if you like but not dis­pos­able ones please.

Brunstane Road South/Gilberstoun, just oppos­ite Brunstane Station.

Download the Poster

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Posted in events, Orchards

Midsummer Orchard Party; Orchard Work Days; Orchard Group Meeting

Posted on May 5, 2010 | 1 Comment

MIDSUMMER’S PARTY — SATURDAY 19 JUNE — at the Orchard, at a time to be con­firmed but likely to be early even­ing onwards.

The next orch­ard work day will take place on Saturday 12th June, from 10 am — 2 pm. Everyone is welcome!

The next Orchard  Group meet­ing will take place on Wednesday 17th June at 7.30 pm in the Dalriada.

Subsequent orch­ard work days are as follows:

Saturday 12 June from 10 am — 2 pm

Saturday 17 July from 10 am — 2 pm
Saturday 28 August from 10 am — 2 pm
Saturday 25 September from 10 am — 2 pm
Saturday 30 October from 10 am — 2 pm — HALLOWE’EN CELEBRATION
Saturday 20 November from 10 am — 2 pm
Saturday 18 December from 10 am — 2 pm — WINTER SOLSTICE CELEBRATION

Hope to see at some of these events.  Please make sure to bring some­thing to eat and drink and wear appro­pri­ate cloth­ing, espe­cially now the nettles have sprung up again.  Even bet­ter, bring some thick gloves and a bag to col­lect some for soup!

What to bring (if you can):

  • Gardening tools (fork, spade, shears, etc) if you have them
  • Gardening gloves
  • Wear work clothes with long sleeves and legs (there are thistles and nettles!)

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Posted in Food, gardening, Orchards

The bees need you…

Posted on March 30, 2010 | 3 Comments
Foxglove and bee

photo: Jane Lewis

The bees need you and we need the bees! Bees are import­ant pol­lin­at­ors and honey pro­du­cers; their num­bers are declin­ing. As part of the orch­ard pro­ject PEDAL are con­sid­er­ing keep­ing bee hives in the orch­ard. It would need a com­mit­ted group with,or to train to get, the skills to set up and look after the hives through the year.It could be a fas­cin­at­ing and reward­ing way to spend some time.
If you are inter­ested in this idea con­tact Tom Ballantine — bal­lan­tine­home [at] tiscali [dot] co [dot] uk or phone 0131 669 0582

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Posted in Food, gardening, Orchards