Two surprisingly topical tasks awaited us on this sunny Sunday morning: freeing a sovereign elder tree from a nasty bramble invasion (maybe we should get involved in global politics?), and levelling up the compost heap in the northern part of the allotment (maybe we should get involved in national politics?). I'm proud to report we successfully completed both tasks, and celebrated our achievements with a round of liquid orchard gold.

On a glorious sunny morning we met at Royate Hill eager to get to work. Some tasks were continuing the great work from previous visits and some new ones.

Russ clearing the path to enlightenment for which he is now famous, with talk of him being the next mayor. Check out those photos!!!

Dave loading the lovely warm steaming woodchip (I hope it was warm this week) into crates for spreading on paths and around trees.

Marianne and Nathalie working away in the chicken hotel filling the compost heaps again after building the sides up a bit. The heaps being seasoned with a bit of charcoal.

Art and Sara shifting some compost before summiting the hill to plant some apple trees, a proud moment.

A cup of apple juice and we were all done and on our way.

Thanks to Dave for the pun :)

Until next time.

In what is becoming a bit of a regular place to help out now we all turned up at the lovely Royate Hill Community Orchard ready for action (apologies if it wasn’t easy to find us 😬).

There was a mixture of tasks to be done from shifting, to finding the path to enlightenment (I think it was clearing a path?), to moving mulch around under the watchful eye of the chickens. Welcome to Marianne joining us for the first time today :)

The time flew past and at the end we had some thirst quenching apple juice from the whale mugs before saying our farewells. We are back again next Sunday at the same time so hope to see you again.

Until next time.

Today's brief felt like a secret mission into the Pyrenees: mulch around some guerilla planted fruit trees on the impossibly steep slopes just outside Royate Hill allotments! A true team effort was required to shovel wood chip into crates, transport the crates to the foot of the hill, and then ascend to the lofty heights where the baby fruit trees basked in the sunshine. Luckily, we had a new GG member to help us (welcome, Sarah!!) and nobody discovered that they had vertigo. Meanwhile, on the ground, team Shears & Rakes cut back the encroaching plant life from a public foot path (you're welcome, Bristol City Council). We were rewarded with lovely thank you's from the allotment crew, including some juicy apples from the orchard. Bring on the next mission!

A lovely crisp sunny winter's day for helping out at the Royate Hill Community Orchard.

Several tasks were tackled:

Phil and Russ shifted a load of compost and repaired a rotten compost bin.

Paul and James headed down to the woodchip pile to load up a load of boxes to be driven up to the Orchard

Richard and Sarah, and later Russ and Phil shifted the boxes out of the car and helped cart them up the hill and mulched around the trunks of the various apple trees.

Thanks for coming along everyone, good work!

I like to be

Woodchippin a tree

With an Octopus gardening

And the Whales

(apologies to the Beatles)

Paths to clear of leaves, woodchip to collect and spread over the paths, but first THE BARRELS OF DEATH!

On a glorious sunny autumn day five goodgymers met at the Royate Hill Community Orchard to get stuck in to a task. The ‘barrels of death’ (as shown by our fabulous model Paul) contained material rotting away into scrumptious compost which would bring life to other areas. We started by shifting this to a compost heap before moving to the main task of spreading woodchip.

The next task was to spread woodchip on the paths and around trees. We split into two teams. The movers and the shakers. The movers, Roz and Emily expertly filled containers with woodchip for the rest of us shakers to spread over the ground. There was an extra task of clearing the leaves from the steps, beautifully demonstrated by Sara.

In case you thought I was just mad with the title (this might not change your opinion) ... at the end we had to choose our spirit animal mug to refresh ourselves with some apple juice. The choices were an octopus or whales of unusual colours.

A lovely way to spend a Sunday morning and we’ll be back again soon.

Until next time :)