Should I stay orchard I go now?

Last night we had 15 wonderful souls out to help Ealing Transition keep on top of the brambles, hedges and general overgrowth in the community orchard.

Big welcome to Sophie who came along for her first ever GoodGym session, she rocked it!

We kicked off the night with a little warm up and introductions where we all went around and said the best thing that came out of lockdown for us. After quite a negative period where we're all grateful to be coming out of the other side it was great to hear some of the positives people have managed to take from the situation! Some got fitter, some gained pets and some learnt new skills, all awesome stuff!

We then took off on our group run around the parks before the task, big up to Shan and Harvey for their excellent back marking skills!

After grabbing tools we made our way down to the garden itself where super taskowner Trevor was ready and waiting for us to get stuck in. He explained how the garden is used for community learning, as an outdoor classroom and forest school. Such a cool and important space!

We were all about bramble control tonight and freeing the trees that were being smoothered in overgrowth. We also kept our taller members on hedge mangement, reaching up to snip them back into shape.

We had a few (okay more than a few!) nettles and prickly plants to deal with but the team smashed it and made a huge dent in the workload in the orchard!

All that was left was to sweep up, return the tools and head to the pub.

What an excellent evening!