Rosamund Community Garden Update June 2023

We had a gorgeous day in the sunshine with a visit from the lovely folks at the Social Research team at Systra, a Woking-based consultancy that specialises in transport, sustainability, and the environment.

We built a very smart new bug hotel, extended our accidental but very popular "bee bank" and did some more landscaping and planting around our new wildlife pond. Thank you Systra for such a productive day.

🗓️ JUNE EVENTS 2023

🌱Cobbing The Hub, Thursday 15th June, 10:30 am to 3.00 pm - FREE event

Galliford Try are returning to help us complete our cob walls on the Hub. If we can get enough people, we could start the wattle and daub panels as well and really get things to the next stage.

Hopefully, our canvas top will be coming towards the end of the month, and then it’ll just be the flooring.

Register HERE

📝GARDEN NEWS FROM CLARE

With all this glorious sunshine and cloudless skies, it’s hard to remember what a wet Spring we had.

The garden is absolutely bursting with life and the promise of Summer fruit is in the orchard, fruit cages, and grapevines.

This month we are very busy planting out our seedlings and thinking up ways to protect them and keep them watered. We’ve got a lovely selection of tomato varieties, and we’re experimenting with different techniques. Some are in the poly-tunnel, some outside in the beds and, under the arbour, we’ve made new, deep beds from manure, woodchips and our compost to try to keep the moisture in.

Coping with hotter, drier summers means we need to use thicker mulches to stop evaporation and cut down on watering. We are guttering the poly-tunnels over the next months and linking up recycled water butts to keep the wildlife ponds topped up and to water the garden.

Sheep wool is a great, cheap mulch that deters slugs and feeds the soil, while keeping the soil moist and at an even temperature. Our blueberry bushes in pots are particularly good this year as a possible result of wool mulching.

“Weeds” are becoming a valuable commodity in sustainable gardening - they keep the integrity of the soil with their roots, retain moisture and stop evaporation by covering the surface. Going forward, we’re experimenting with a cut-and-leave method of weeding and mulching. This leaves the roots and stops soil damage, mulches the plants, and minimizes watering. Watch this space!!

Over the next month we’ll be working with Sarah and Claire to help raise plants for the Zero Carbon Guildford living walls etc at the event on July 15th ‘Guildford Goes Wild’. This will showcase what can be grown in limited spaces, using upcycled pallets for vertical planting.

Thanks to our busy sowers, we have lots of excess plants to donate to the project, and hopefully some to give for fundraising projects.

🕐JUNE JOBS AT THE GARDEN

• Watering around the Arbour and the polytunnels.

• Checking the soft-fruit bushes and vines and watering if needed.

• Planting out our remaining young plants and mulching.

• Scything or strimming the long grass around the orchard trees.

• Sitting and enjoying the birds with a cuppa!

📰UPDATES & BLOGS FROM COMMUNITY PROJECTS

🐝”What’s Happening with the Bees at the Bottom of the Garden?” by Peter Smith

CLICK TO READ

🕊️”Change Over Time” by the Guildford Swift Project

CLICK TO VIEW

AND FINALLY🔚

We have our first lily on the pond! CLICK TO VIEW

See you soon.

Happy June Gardening!

🌳GARDEN VOLUNTEER GROUP SESSIONS

We are building some regular groups on Tuesday and Sunday 2.00 pm - 4.00 pm and Friday 10.00 am - 12.00 pm so if you want to come and garden together, just turn up. If you are in our WhatsApp group, please also use this to check if people are in the garden for a session.

💰MEMBERSHIP 

The Rosamund Community Garden (RCG) shares a membership system with Guildford Environmental Forum (GEF) for joining info please email [email protected]

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