Members of the Community Supported Agriculture veg box scheme will get a weekly share of the harvest from the Market Garden during the growing season.
If you are interested in becoming a member and getting veg from the farm, please click here to register your interest: http://bit.ly/EACCSAform
You’ll also find more details about the veg boxes from there, and answers to FAQs (and you can chat to us in person at upcoming events).
Community Supported Agriculture is a partnership between farmers and local communities. It is one of the best ways to create a fairer and more regenerative food system. We are excited to start providing veg boxes, and we hope you will join us!
Heart Research UK Healthy Heart Tip, written by the Health Promotion and Education Team at Heart Research UK
Healthy Heart Tip: The Power of Gardening
It is National Gardening Day on 14th April in the UK and as the weather starts to (slowly!) warm up, it is a great time to get outside. Gardening is associated with many health benefits including improved physical, mental and social wellbeing.
Mowing the lawn, digging, weeding and other gardening tasks can help us stay active and hit our weekly exercise goal and simply spending more time outdoors has been shown to improve sleep. If you don’t have a garden, or outdoor space, you can still reap many of the benefits by planting in pots on windowsills or joining a local gardening group near you.
Read on for our top tips to get started and ideas of what to grow:
Getting started
Whether you are growing indoors or outdoors, a thriving plant starts with good soil. The surest way to make sure your plants get off to a good start is to buy a bag of compost and use this to start your seedlings; once they are well-established you can re-plant them into regular soil in your garden.
To save money on buying little pots, you can start your seedlings in clean yoghurt pots or any other containers you can save from your kitchen, just poke something sharp through the bottom to allow for some drainage.
Grow heart-healthy herbs
Eating too much salt can contribute to increased blood pressure, using herbs in cooking is a great way to add flavour without adding salt. Herbs are one of the easiest things to grow and great for beginners to try. They are a great choice for indoor growing as they do well in pots on a sunny windowsill.
If you’re planting them outdoors, choose the sunniest spot you can find. Chives, mint, basil, parsley, and thyme are just a few that are easy to care for. You can either grow from seeds or buy the small plants from the supermarket and re-pot them.
Involve the whole family
Gardening is a hobby for all ages, and it’s a nice activity to do with children. Children love to see flowers grow and growing vegetables together can be a great way to encourage them to try them, which is especially helpful if you have a picky eater.
It is also a great way to introduce a little responsibility in the form of caring for something else, let children choose what flowers and vegetables they want to grow and watch the sense of joy they get from seeing the fruits of their labour.
Dobbies, the UK’s leading garden centre, is hosting a free session in Edinburgh for its Little Seedlings Club on Sunday 4 September. During this workshop, children aged 4 to 10 will learn how to grow their own fruit and how they can enjoy some of their five a day this autumn.
Dobbies’ Little Seedlings Club provides exciting interactive learning activities that allow children in Edinburgh to understand, explore, and connect with plants, wildlife, and the environment around them.
September’s workshop is set to be fun-filled and educational with a key focus on how you can grow fresh fruit in your garden space. The workshop will cover the early history of different fruit, as well as diving into the science, illustrating how we classify those frequently misidentified as vegetables.
Children will also learn about the health benefits, along with how different fruits grow and how to plant their own at home. There will also be a crafting activity.
Dobbies’ Partnership and Events Manager, Sarah Murray, explained: “Our Little Seedling Club is very popular and we hope to encourage and nurture young people’s passion for growing their own crops.
“We’re looking forward to highlighting all the health and wellbeing benefits of fruit, as well as having lots of fun.”
Advance booking is required to secure a free spot at the September Little Seedlings Club.
For more information on how children can participate at Dobbies’ Edinburgh store, visit: events.dobbies.com.
Ageing Well, Edinburgh Leisure’s successful project promoting healthy lifestyles for older adults in Edinburgh, is launching their allotment programme at Leith Links.
… and Lottery success for Granton Community Gardeners
A mother who lost her son in the most tragic of circumstances has today welcomed a National Lottery cash boost that will allow the Scottish Cot Death Trust to support many more bereaved parents to come together to share their experiences. Local project Granton Community Gardeners also received some welcome news this morning – the project is to receive over £78,000 to support and expand it’s programme of activities.Continue reading Bereaved families to benefit from National Lottery investment
The Power of Food is a city-wide festival celebrating community gardening, with events and activities on throughout the city on the weekend of 17th/18th June, and North Edinburgh Arts is participating in the festival this year on Saturday 17th.
Wullie, our new gardener, will be in the garden from 10 til 1 giving tours and talking about our garden
PLUS we have a FREE yoga session between 11 and 12 in the garden (suitable for all abilities, yoga mats are provided).
Go to https://poweroffoodfestival.wordpress.com for more information or get in touch with us directly here at NEA.
