Next Meeting: ‘An Introduction to Permaculture’

Our next meeting is 7pm on Tuesday 12th October at Bentley Baptist Church (please use the door at the rear of the building).

John Briggs will be giving an Introduction to Permaculture.

We’ll also be talking about CAR SHARE, SEASONAL FOODS & much, much more.

Don’t forget, there’s also FREE TEA

Click here to download a PDF of the POSTER

Have A Grow Heroes

Our next meeting, ‘Have A Grow Heroes’, is on Tuesday 8th June at Bentley Baptist Church.

Our Incredible Edible Adventure

A day with Incredible Edible Todmorden, “Treesponsibility”

and Hebden Bridge Transition Town group

Organised by Transition Town Bentley, Sunday 16^th May 2010

As we pulled up in the car park of Todmorden station, a woman – I guessed in her sixties – approached our minibus, wearing a striking felt hat. There was a glint of mischief in her eyes. I realised we were in for something unusual.

Estelle

Our party of 26 assorted Doncastrians of all ages, shapes and sizes – curious about what was going on in Todmorden – followed Estelle like a brood of unruly chicks around mother hen. She showed us all round the centre of this little Calder Valley town. Raised beds with vegetables and salad crops growing are round every other corner, with signs inviting the passer-by to help themselves as soon as the crops are ready. The health centre’s car park has beds planted out as an apothecary’s garden, with herbs to help with many common ailments. The borders of the supermarket car park are planted out with Lidl’s own budget fruit trees.

Estelle pointed out that whilst traditionally planted flower beds sometimes get damaged or strewn with litter – the veg beds don’t. It’s as if, she said, we’re genetically hard-wired to respect food growing.

At one of Todmorden’s primary schools, squeezed into a small space near the middle of the town, the play areas are all tarmac. But the children walk through an old graveyard to the school gate. Spare patches of ground in the graveyard have been turned into beds and planted up by the children, in an immensely popular school project. As she talked, Estelle warmed to her theme – education being at the centre of what Incredible Edible Todmorden is really all about. Today’s children learning the skills of growing, cooking, preserving, looking after the land and the soil.

At the high school, a germ of an idea two years ago has now turned into a project with grant funding worth £750,000 – where in 2011 the school is to become a centre for land-based skills. The whole curriculum is being linked to sustainability and food-growing.

After our walk, we clambered up the hill to Todmorden’s imposing Unitarian church, and tumbled gratefully through the doors to be greeted by Mary and the welcome sight of tea and biscuits, served in a remarkable array of quaint cups and saucers. A warm, motherly figure, Mary’s enthusiasm for the project was unmistakable. Again, I sensed a bit of a rogue!

Once refreshed, she sat us down at the front of the church. The high-roofed, marble-pillared interior was imposing, dimly lit, and chilly – a couple of small electric heaters glowed away to one side of the pulpit in a valiant but hopeless effort. To the other side, a screen had been set up for a powerpoint presentation. A third figure appeared at the front of the church. She introduced herself as Pam.

Pam looked serious. Is this going to be the sober bit, I wandered? Then she launched into the presentation, no notes, and no holes barred. Here’s another one, I thought to myself. She told us about how all this had got started, when they first learned of the issues that “Peak Oil”, resource shortages and climate change are likely to confront us with. “Right – we need to do something – let’s just Do It”, was the spirit of their response.

They chose action around food. A language everyone can understand. It connects with children straight away – and they wanted to build for 20, 30, 40 years ahead. There’s no master plan in Todmorden – just actions, actions, actions. And it’s working. People have come to find out what’s happening here from all over the world – it’s a shared concern.

Pam talked about spinning three plates – the first one is Community. Getting people involved. There’s a “showbiz” side to this – making it fun, making it visible. The second one is Learning. Looking longer-term, this is at the heart of the work. The third is Business – as it grows, businesses get interested, and new opportunities develop.

Click here for a Slideshow of the presentation – better still pay them a visit yourself

There are two simple principles they work by. Number 1 – we are not victims. So it’s not about blaming or grumbling – it’s about doing. Number 2 – don’t ask for money. So they’re beholden to no-one for the development of the project. Once it’s up and running, then ask.

Mary took over at this point, and continued the story. What do you have to do to be a member here? – It’s very simple, “If you eat, you’re in”. An invitation to help plant an orchard attracted 200 people. To start vegetable growing in schools, they tracked down some unwanted leaky rowing boats – one for each school, filled them with soil, and we’re off. They’ve now planted over 500 fruit trees, in five orchards. New businesses include pickle-making, and the first Todmorden Cheese. Finally, a resident who was terminally ill wanted to help – so an award for growing was created in his name, with a cup. As Mary put it, “Don’t let dying stop you.”

By now, tummies were rumbling. We wound our way back down into the town, to the Bear Café where we met Barbara and Penny from “Treesponsibility”.  Penny was wearing an old coat and wellies, which gave a clue as to what was to come.  But first, we nourished ourselves with the café’s delicious, hearty fare. Having eaten, a number of the party dallied in the shop below, poring over a range of local goodies. The party straggled back to the bus – herding cats came to mind – but in the end, we were off into the hills above the town.

We were soon trampling across the hill near the beautiful hamlet of Lumbutts, carrying tree seedlings, protective tubes and all manner of heavy blunt instruments. Like Doncaster, Todmorden has experienced serious flooding. During heavy rains, water drains off the surrounding unprotected hills and becomes a torrent, heading for the towns and villages below.

Treesponsibility set about re-planting the surrounding hillsides, which have been denuded by a combination of forest clearance, mining and heavy grazing. Since 1998 they’ve planted thousands of native trees – and now new woodland is beginning to appear. As we looked over the landscape of young trees, an errant sheep was spotted amongst them. Seeing this, Penny pronounced it born out of wedlock, and grabbed her mobile to alert the farmer.

Then it was down winding lanes, with much skilful manoeuvring of the bus near precipitous edges by Phil, our driver, and into the next town up the Calder Valley. Here we were to meet the good people of Transition Town Hebden Bridge. We headed for the White Swan, and once ensconced with pints in the sunny garden found the TTHB folks were also ensconced, ready to meet us – at the White Lion. This little confusion was soon cleared up, and in the mellow afternoon sun we heard a lively account of building community interest around “what it’s going to take” to transition to a low-carbon, sustainable local economy.

Transition Town Hebden Bridge are about to have a big “launch event” over the last weekend in May. There was much swapping of phone numbers and email addresses, and it looks like Transition Town Bentley are going to be there.

Finally, another herding cats exercise and it was back to the bus. A tired and satisfied party wound its way back across the Pennines, to start the transition of Doncaster in earnest.

Original text by Adam Howard

Pictures by Greenjacker & Incredible Edible Todmorden

Websites:

Incredible Edible Todmorden: www.incredible-edible-todmorden.co.uk/

Treesponsibility: http://www.treesponsibility.com/

Transition Town Hebden Bridge: www.hebdenbridgetransitiontown.org.uk/

Weekly Update May 15th

Tuesday’s meeting went very well indeed; it was very well attended despite us lacking the manpower to get posters and flyers out as much as we would like.

John Brigg’s gave some excellent tips about ‘Growing In A Small Space‘. The containers we used are available for FREE from Doncaster Market – they’re the plastic tubs that are used to transport mushrooms. We lined them with plastic and planted a range of seeds from herbs like oregano sage and rosemary to leafy green cut-and-come-again salad plants – yum

We’ll post photos as they grow in the coming weeks.

The next event is, of course, our trip to Incredible Edible Todmorden on Sunday May 16th.

Transition Town Bentley – May Meeting: Growing in a Small Space

Tuesday 11th May, 7pm, Bentley Baptist Church*

Askern Road, Bentley, Doncaster, DN5 0EW

Think you haven’t got room to ‘grow your own’? Think again!

Join us for a practical lesson in growing food crops in small spaces. Go on, get your hands dirty, better still bring the kids and get their hands dirty

Join the ‘ONE POT PLEDGE‘.

Also: Garden Share, New Allotments, Community Orchard, Todmorden Trip, Natural Flood Defences, Growing on Wasteland in Bentley and, lots, lots, more.

Come on… ‘GIVE IT A GROW!’

*Corner of Askern Road & Shakespeare Road (please use the door to the rear)

A Trip To ‘Incredible Edible Todmorden’

Trip to Incredible Edible Todmorden: 16th May, 2010

8:30am from NDDT Resource Centre. £11.00 per person.

The people of Todmorden have transformed their town by making good use of waste-ground and neglected areas. Where there used to be litter, dust and broken glass, there’s now salad leaves, veggies, fruit and herbs – and they’re free for anyone to pick!

Every school in the town is now involved with planting and growing. And public bodies – like the fire station and the railway station – are discovering new ways to use their spare land.

So join TRANSITION TOWN BENTLEY (TTB) as they visit Todmorden to find out just what we can do to improve the quality of life – and food! – in our own area. This is more than just a day-trip; TTB have already spliced the apple trees that will be used to create Bentley’s first Community Orchard and are busy identifying plots of land that could become Community Gardens of our own.

(TTB meet every second Tuesday of the month, 7pm at Bentley Baptist Church)

For more details ring Michaela at the NDDT on 01302 874587

North Doncaster Development Trust
Bentley Resource Centre
High Street
Bentley
Doncaster
DN5 0AA

Click for map

Click here to download & print the POSTER

Click here to download & print the FLYER

A 10 Point Plan for Doncaster North…

People involved with the Transition Town Bentley group have recently been inspired by Incredible Edible Todmorden.

So much so that we’ve begun to follow their 10 Point Plan…

1. Build schools for the future that have the living edible world at their heart.
2. Transform health buildings with edible plants and trees as an integral part of the design and workplace.
3. All public bodies to release land for food growing.
4. Plan for food – Support local food production through the planning system with all local plans identifying places for growing.
5. Tick all the boxes – Make growing a performance indicator for ‘wellbeing’ for all Public Services.
6. Insist all new homes to have ready-to-grow spaces.
7. All social landlords to allocate space for growing.
8. Charter for truly local markets – support local food producers and farmers and campaign for the reallocation of subsidies.
9. Make sure public bodies like schools and health authorities have as a priority to procure local food.
10. Invest in food skills for the future. We need incredible degrees and diplomas, cooks and technologists, farmers and fabulous food producers.

Let’s try for 10 for 10 in 2010!

If you live in the North Doncaster Corridor and would like to get involved then email us at edible.bentley[at]gmail.com