Our friends at Trust Juice, who market juice from our and other orchards and support GOT with the proceeds, have recently started supplying the Farm Shop at Gloucester Services on the M5 with their juice. Read more about them on the Westmorland (who run the services) website here or watch the video, made at GOT’s Longney Orchards, here:
A few snippets of news from last month in our Longney orchards – including the new signboards, barn, the plums, the community and the wildlife.
We are hoping to do repairs to the barn, on the boundary of Long Tyning and Bollow orchards, this summer, and have been clearing the vegetation around it in preparation for this. Particular thanks are due to Martin, Alison and the Monday special needs school kids for clearing the wire and vegetation on the north and east sides and to David and Martin for additional clearing on the southern end.
There has also been much remedial pruning of the plums in Bollow orchard, carried out by Martin and David in recent weeks. Summer pruning of plums helps to reduce any further infection with Silver Leaf Disease.
Meanwhile, in Longney village, we have been promoting GOT and explaining our involvement in the orchards at the Longney village school fete, where Alison and Martin found Trust Juice to be a real draw that led to lots of conversations about the orchards and their wider value.
New sign boards have recently been designed (thanks Jane) for the orchards, one for each of the three entrances – from Longney, and North and south from the river path. These will be installed soon.
And, last but not least, John Fletcher has been recording wildlife, particularly birds, at the orchards. His most recent bird lists include Barn Owls, Buzzard, Swifts (circling the orchards all afternoon), Great Spotted Woodpecker, Green Woodpecker, Dunnock, Green Finch, Chiffchaff, Blackcap, Song Thrush, Bullfinch, Collared Dove, Reed Bunting, Sedge Warbler (one pair busy taking food to a hidden nest to some very noisy young) and Reed Warbler. Some of John’s excellent photos of his Longney sightings are shown in the slideshow below (all pictures copyright John Fletcher):
Today we launched our Orchards Exhibition at Gloucester Life Museum, where it will stay until just before Christmas. The launch party was a modest affair, but was attended by many of our most enthusiastic supporters! This is the first time we have created an exhibition of this sort and we are hopeful this approach will enthuse an even wider audience than usual.
We are very grateful to Three Counties Traditional Orchard Project and the Heritage Lottery Fund for supporting the exhibition and to Gloucester Life Museum for hosting it. You can see it at the Museum until mid-December, and after that some of the panels will transfer to the barn at our orchards in Longney. Some pictures from today’s launch follow below as a slide show.
Our Longney Orchards were host this month to Creative Camping, run by a Gloucestershire-based project running innovative children’s services projects.
The camping project enables disabled and non-disabled teenagers to spend the weekend together under canvas, encouraging self agency, positive risk taking, cooperation, friendship and inclusion. And, in this location, also helping build understanding and appreciation of traditional orchards! Here are a few pictures of the camp this month – more are planned.
You can find out more about Creative Camping and Creative Sustainability CIC (who run the camps) on their website here: http://www.cscic.org/info/
‘Creative Camping is not just an event is a place close to my heart. Before going to creative camping I was a shy a non-confident person who was too sacred to talk to new people …’
We are now posting all news in a ‘blog’ format which should help us post updates and news on a regular basis. The post you’re reading now will always be at the top, – scroll down to read the latest posts. There are also links in the side-bar and from social media. You can also search for news by clicking on the category listings above this text.
Trust Juice is pressed unsprayed apples from Gloucestershire orchards, including our own Gloucestershire Orchard Trust orchards at Longney.
The fruit is picked by volunteers, including a little help from 
students from the Apperley Centre, the Shrubberies School.
The aim is to give all the profits made from sales of Trust Juice to organisations and activities related to the conservation and celebration of traditional orchards in Gloucestershire, including Gloucestershire Orchard Trust.
Trust Juice is available £24 for 12 bottles.
Phone Martin Hayes 07900 985679 or Alison Parfitt 01242 584982.
Alison Parfitt alisonparfitt@phonecoop.coop
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