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Fruit for free in a community orchard

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Is there room in Leith for a community orchard where trees bloom in spring, people meet to chat and gather fruit in autumn and kids play all year round?

Pragueorchard1.jpgFruit trees can thrive in cities and orchards can provide fantastic green spaces for local communities as I discovered when I was visiting Prague recently.  One afternoon I went looking for the public orchards described by Catherine Lloyd of the Central Core Network (now part of the National Orchard Forum).  She had given me a pretty tantalising picture of finding the old fruit trees at sunset with church bells ringing round her.  I am pretty sure I found it  – with the sunset and church bells too – and it was such a great place we went back there several times to sit and look out across the city through apple, cherry and almond trees – along with a lot of other tourists, parties of school kids and local people meeting friends. 

Admittedly Prague has a head start.  These orchards pictured here  are a legacy of the monastery near the Castle.  But it doesn’t take long to establish new fruit trees. Community orchards are growing across Scotland and644604-553186-thumbnail.jpg one of the best examples I know is just up the M90 in the Tayside town of Newburgh.

Sandy’s Orchard was planted last autumn by children of Newburgh Primary School and has just produced its first crop of apples, pears and plums.  Community organisers say that although the site is owned (and managed) by Fife Council the real secret of success is involving children who cajole their parents into helping too.  Now there is an after school club, local artists are designing benches and children are learning how to take cuttings and write labels identifying different varieties of fruit.  And all because Newburgh Orchard Group wanted to revive the ancient tradition of fruit growing in their area.     


You can find more details by clicking here for the Newburgh Orchard Group website and discover how to start a local fruit group through the National Orchard Forum. And if you think there is room to do something like this in Leith please get in touch with Greener Leith and Leith Open Space Group!
 
by Fay Young of Leith Open Space Group

Posted on Thursday, November 16, 2006 at 01:10PM by Registered CommenterFay and filed under these categories Listen |

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