Hello and welcome to March’s garden update.

📅UPCOMING EVENTS AT THE GARDEN

• Today! Saturday 1st March, 2:00 pm to 3:30 pm, Family Gardening Session at Rosamund Community Garden Bring the whole family for some outdoor fun! It’s a wonderful opportunity to connect with nature, learn new skills, and enjoy the fresh air. First Saturday of each month » non members REGISTER HERE 

• Tomorrow! Sunday 2nd March - 2:30 pm to 4:30 pm BIG JOB Sunday - Making Compost Bays at the garden. All welcome, simply show up.

• Sunday 16th March, 11:00 am to 12:30 pm, Women’s Empowerment Circle at Rosamund Community Garden. This facilitated gathering allows you to slow down, breathe deeply, and reconnect with yourself and others in a nurturing environment. 2 spaces remain » BOOKING AND INFO

🌍EVENTS AT ZERO GUILDFORD » CLICK

🌱GARDEN NEWS

by Clare Millington

It’s a very exciting month as the first signs of Spring are appearing at the garden and the light has changed to stimulate new growth. The trees and fruit bushes have their buds on and I’ve even seen some early cherry blossom in the area!

The longer days and warmth have boosted the salads in the poly-tunnel and we’ve been enjoying some delicious leaves - mizuna, rocket, chervil, mustards and lettuce make for a spicy mix we never get in the shops.

The oriental salads are great for the spring and autumn plantings, providing food before and after the summer crops take over. They tend to flower and go to seed once it gets hotter, so now is a great time to sow them for new leaves. We’ll be sowing direct and in modules, and the great thing about the spicy plants is the mice and slugs tend to leave them alone.

Outside, we will use a cardboard and compost mulch on the beds to suppress the weeds and leave the soil un-disturbed. This is a great quick method to build up the soil's nutrients and keep the integrity of the vital micro-organisms living there.

The Edible Forest Garden area is now planted with the trees that will provide the canopy layer. We are planning to sow some cover crops next month (cover crops provide nutrients and structure to the soil and stop it drying out or becoming waterlogged) while we slowly add in the other permanent layers. 

Our Wassail event was a lovely get together with perfect weather and lots of laughter. We blessed the orchard, drank a toast, made a lot of noise to drive out the spirits and crowned our king and queen. I even managed a poem, with dodgy rhyming, click here for video! It felt really lovely to get together in the Hub for a natter and catch up. Yummy cakes and biccies too.

The Wassail failed to deter the naughty rabbits from nibbling our poor fruit-trees, so we’ve wrapped and guarded all the rest of the orchard. Apparently it can take a long time before you can see if a tree has died from bark damage, so we’ll just have to wait and see and replace any if needed. Because of this, we won’t prune the trees this year to allow them to recover. 

We have a new group from Surrey County Council coming to volunteer once a monthat the garden. The project is called Men’s Pitstop and is a new county-wide initiative to provide platforms for men to come together for mental health and wellbeing support. The group at Rosamund will focus on carpentry projects and completing the Hub.

The group from Andy’s Man Club have completed the supports for the hub roof and with the guidance of Tony the chippie, have created the first 2 trellises in our outside meeting place. They’ve also started on a wood store for the Hub and made some much needed edging for the poly-tunnels and outside beds. The feedback has been really positive and the men have really enjoyed working together in our lovely environment.

Our wishes have been granted for a supply of woodchip, with an big load delivered by Oli from Bill Kears (SCC contractor) Hopefully, they’ll be able to keep us in chip going forward, and we can happily add to our mulched areas and composts in abundance. 

We also had an enormous delivery of carrots from FareShare, so we need to crack on and build our upgraded compost heaps. We need lots of bodies to achieve this quickly, so if you have spare time, please join our group sessions and help out. Many hands etc! (see last month’s newsletter here for info about FareShare)

With thanks to Amy for completing the Hibernaculum sign! The children have also started filling in the bug hotel at the entrance.

We’ve had lots of sightings of a barn owl hunting in the meadows below the garden, and we’re pretty sure it’s been using the treebog to roost. Sarah Davis (Guildford Swift Project) has been researching how we can support the owl population around the site, and will be organising for boxes to be made and installed. We hope to have one installed on our boundary tree and a platform put onto the treebog for them to continue roosting.

Nothing captured on Paul’s wildlife camera yet. Paul has kindly offered to build nest boxes for smaller birds using offcuts from the carpenters. We’ll place them around the garden, and with any luck, we’ll have some new feathered families by next spring.

Meanwhile, Helen recorded the short video below, and Mark Hargreaves captured the cover photo of the Barn Owl in flight while checking on the cows, who will be moving on soon. If you're unable to open the link, let us know, we can upload the original video to our members' WhatsApp group.

rosamundguildford

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👩🏻‍🌾MARCH JOBS AT THE GARDEN

• Sow seeds either directly in poly tunnel 1 or into modules, following Charles Dowding's calendar

• Put cardboard and compost (from heaps) around plants and onto weedy areas

• Make compost bays and move carrots/woodchip.

• Cut down dead flowerheads and stems in beds

• Make edging for Forest garden and comfrey border.

💮PLANT OF THE MONTH by Helen Harris

Snowdrop  

Latin name: Galanthus nivalis

Habitat and distribution: 

Native to Europe and the Middle East, snowdrops have a firm foothold in the UK, where they thrive in damp soil in woodlands, meadows, riverbanks and gardens.

Conservation status: Listed as Near Threatened on the global IUCN Red List of Threatened Species.

Description: 

The snowdrop is a delicate, nodding 6-part white flower edged in green, with grey/green linear leaves. Heralding the end of winter and the promise of spring, snowdrops typically bloom between January and March. These perennials are geophytes – meaning that they have an underground storage system (bulb, tuber or corm). They are well adapted to the cold, able to break through the snow to reveal their pristine white blossoms. 

Value to wildlife:

As they flower so early, snowdrops do not rely on pollinators to reproduce. Instead, they spread via bulb division. However, they may still be visited by bees and other insects on a particularly warm day.

Folklore:

Snowdrops are steeped in folklore across various cultures, often regarded as symbols of hope and purity. According to one legend, snowdrops first appeared when an angel transformed snowflakes into flowers to comfort Eve as she was banished from the Garden of Eden. In another tale, the flowers sprang up where the Virgin Mary's tears fell as she wept for Jesus.

Despite their beauty, sight of a single snowdrop was considered a harbinger of death and snowdrops were once considered ill omens when brought indoors. 

Regional names: 

Candlemass Bells, Mary’s Taper, Snow Piercer, February Fairmaids and Dingle-dangle

Biochemistry and uses:

The resilience of snowdrops in freezing temperatures is a marvel of nature. The flowers contain a natural antifreeze protein that prevents their cells from freezing. Additionally, snowdrops generate a small amount of heat through a process called thermogenesis, which helps them melt the surrounding snow and emerge into the light.

Traditionally, snowdrops were used to treat headaches and as a painkiller. The bulb is poisonous to humans, however. They contain galantamine, an alkaloid that inhibits the breakdown of acetylcholine (a neurotransmitter) and is used in the treatment of Alzheimer's disease. 

Sources: Woodland Trust, Wildlife Trust, Plantlife websites and Microsoft Copilot AI

MEMBERSHIP 

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

We look forward to seeing you in the garden soon!