Well the initial hot weather and wet and windy weather for the rest of August hasn’t stopped progress at the garden. Seeing the garden full of colour and life in August has been very special as we approach the garden’s 1 year anniversary at the end of this month.

Since we are not able to safely hold a celebration this year, we are putting together a special 1 year anniversary newsletter to share with you all very soon.

Wildlife

We discovered lots of holes all over the garden and various different theories were put forward. The mystery was solved when the newly installed wildlife camera captured this!

Butterfly Bank

This bank should make a big contribution to butterfly conservation within the garden, providing a specialised habitat facing south that will be planted with specific, wild flower plants that are the caterpillar food plants of certain butterfly species, and it will also hold some nectar-rich flowers for various butterflies to feed upon. The bank is made primarily from cut turf usefully donated from the grassland that has had paths cut through it elsewhere in the garden. A topping of small, limestone aggregate is now being sought that will act as a mulch and also provide an alkaline soil environment that suits most of the plants intended for the bank. Plants will be planted through the aggregate into the up-turned turf below, and some seeding might also be carried out. The curved bank design should be more pleasing on the eye than a straight feature, and the various parts of the bank will benefit from sunlight at different times during the day. The bank will require maintenance and ‘fine tuning’ as we go along but it will surely be a worthwhile endeavour.

Jim Steele, Butterfly Conservation Officer for Derbyshire

We held the Big Butterfly Count on 1 August 2020 aided by Jim and Bob Deavin, local bird expert. We identified 9 different species – 2 large whites, 2 small whites, 2 green vein whites, 1 brimstone, 1 meadow brown, 2 gatekeepers, 1 comma and 1 small tortoiseshell. We are looking forward to comparing this data with next year’s once the Butterfly Bank and garden are more established.

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Sensory Garden

The Sensory Garden is looking fantastic right now and we can actually say it is FINISHED! Well in so far as the landscaping, planting, mulching and different paths are now completed but as this is a garden, there will still be plenty to keep us occupied and develop further!

If you haven’t visited the garden yet or haven’t been for a while, be sure to come and visit and see the Sensory Garden in Summer with all its different colours, scents and textures.

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Children’s Gardening Area

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Produce

The raised beds have continued do really well and volunteers have been able to share plenty of produce already in our growing season. The squash has absolutely loved growing in the tractor tyre as have the tomatoes, which will be ready to be harvested soon. The raspberry bed in the food forest is full of berries at the moment and hopefully next year, the young fruit trees will be producing plenty of produce.

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One of SEAG’s missions has always been to share the Garden’s produce with the community and our volunteer Ruth handed over some produce from the Garden to Marlpool United Reformed Church, which was added to food parcels put together by volunteers. This project is facilitated by FareShare and Rural Action Derbyshire. If you or anyone you know in the local community is in need of a food parcel, contact Yvonne on 07792 770512.

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Friendship Bench

We launched the garden’s Friendship Bench on 15 August 2020 and welcomed our first visitors. You can read more here about the idea behind the Bench and how it came to be.

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Other news …

• On the 23 August 2020 we were joined by Barry Collins of BJ Collins Protected Species Surveyors and his family to talk to members and volunteers about potential ideas for the Garden to make it as wildlife friendly as possible. We are very grateful for Barry to give up his free time to share his expert advice and knowledge with us and we have lots more ideas to add to the list of projects to consider.

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• The Polytunnel has been delivered and work has started on preparing the area. We are super excited to get the Polytunnel built as this will mean we will be able to grow much more produce and plants and extend our growing season. Going into Winter it will also give us some shelter until our wooden structure is built.

• A very special Elm Tree ‘Ademuz’, a rare wild Spanish Field Elm was donated and planted by Jim Steele. This will hopefully be there long after any of us!

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