Dear fellow Bradley Folders,

Our September update is full of praise for our volunteers…and reminders also to prepare for winter.

Well done to our fellow plot holder Ken who has masterminded the repair and the return of our front gates. We have been waiting in vain for months for the Council to make any progress in securing our boundaries.  Our committee colleague Stephen suggested that we had the skills in-house to manage the restoration so well done to Stephen, Ken, and everyone else involved. Another step in our recovery! 

Congratulations also to everyone involved in harvesting and delivering excess produce to food banks, charities, and other good causes. These contributions help enormously as evidence of our community connections when we apply for funding for our improvement projects so many thanks to all the volunteers and in particular Liz for the co-ordination.

The final formal Produce Day takes place tomorrow September 7 so please leave good quality produce on the trestles in the front car park.  Do let us know also if you could help as a volunteer driver and drop them off at local charities … we have a list of eager recipients always keen to cook.  Volunteers for harvesting please meet up at 11 outside the shop. The drivers will be required on Monday and Tuesday. Contributions also welcome of cardboard boxes and punnets to distribute the goods. 

If you fancy pressing your own apples, then do contact Jack Glonek who manages our allotment apple press and will explain how to use it, and how to progress from apple juice to making cider.

Similarly if you’d like a brewer to collect your harvest and return a couple of bottles, then do let me know.  My son George Charlton is a craft brewer (Pomona Island, Blackjack, Strawflower Ales, and Reasons To Be Cheerful beer cafe on Fog Lane) and if he can get at least 20kg, he’ll brew a Bradley Fold batch for us. 

We’ve got more volunteers coming on site from our partners Turner and Townsend on September 19 and 26 to help harvest, maintain community areas and plant fruit trees and bushes. If you’d like to assist supervising, then do let Liz know, thanks.  We need supervisors to manage a two-hour slot, you don’t need to be strong but just enjoy the fun of guiding fit volunteers working hard.  Liz provides full instructions. 

Donations are also welcome of cardboard and pallets, do please leave them outside the shop, underneath the container.

Plans are for the shop to reopen this weekend Sunday September 7tth so you can prepare your plots for winter….remember to be flood resilient… mark all your belongings, weigh down water butts and sheds, consider green manure to hold your soil in place. Fingers crossed we won’t have another flood but we are sited on the floodplain so it’s always a real possibility.

Work continues chasing the authorities and trying to secure our boundaries along Ford Lane and with the golf club. We’d be grateful if anyone has access to free hedging whips – particularly hawthorn or other native species.  Likewise we will gratefully accept donations of fruit bushes for the community gardens… drop them by the shop in time for the volunteer working parties on the 19th and 26th.

Also if anyone has contacts with local schools who would like a day out to tour the allotments, spotting trees and wildlife, then do let us know. We’re always happy to welcome community groups. They’d have to bring their own CRB supervisors, and we can work alongside them. 

Do continue to enjoy your harvests,

with best regards from all the committee, Janine