Sunday 3 November 2024

ECCG: Annual Review 2023-2024


A summer gathering with Transition Cambridge

Here is our Annual Review, compiled by Charlotte and presented at the AGM of Transition Cambridge. We covered some of the highlights in our blog, look back at the posts - see panel on your right for a selection.

It has been a peculiar year at Empty Common. The wet and mild weather of the las two years has seriously affected the balance of things. With no frost to kill the gastropod eggs and wonderfully cool damp summers we have, like everyone else, been inundated with gastropods. This spring was spent growing microgreens for gastropods, and that’s not funny. 

Many seeds drowned and those that achieved those first two precious leaves were eaten. Some crops were sown and nurtured four times without success. For the first time we succumbed to tempting our fat gastropods to their death with beer. Good crops were beans, beetroot, carrots, basil and tomatoes but it has been disheartening for all vegetable growers and we are already short of volunteers. Another thug within the garden has been the bindweed. Completely out of control and it is going to be a long slow job to tame it. Any bindweed haters who wish to take their anger or despair out on bindweed are welcome.

On the plus sides, which are many, the garden is still doing well, mainly thanks to Ben Womack and it has provided a wonderful space for many activities. 


Meeting hut update

Having raised £375 through crowdfunding, John and I fitted a wood burner over the winter and finished off many of the smaller jobs including the disco lighting. We are now well equipped with 12-volt lighting, 240-volt sockets and USB ports. We are looking for a projector for small film shows if anyone knows of a spare. 

The hut and garden together have hosted several events:

  • A couple of “Healing Words” creative writing workshops,
  • The concluding morning of a two-day imaginarium titled “Seeds in the DIRT”, where writers from all over the country met to discuss how to reduce the writing industry’s footprint.
  • Water Sensitive Cambridge held a community water ceremony “Honour the Water.”
  • Cambridge Permaculture Group have been meeting monthly. A small but very happy group where we have a little rest from all the things we do in life and exchange ideas, knowledge, and friendship.
  •  “Drawn to Nature,” an art group used the hut for one of their art days.

Cambridge Climate Therapists, Resilience Web, The Woodcraft Folk, and a dance group have also used the garden and hut while locals celebrated a very wet Chinese New Year.

Several Transition Cambridge get-togethers have taken place in the garden and of course Anna’s Birthday. 

Other events included:

A visit by Charles Dowding, the famous “No Dig” grower who was appalled by the number of homes we’d built for gastropods. Wanting the garden to be a part of the wider ecosystem has its drawbacks. 

As usual we took part in the RSPB’s annual Big Bird Count.

We talked permaculture gardening on the Cambridge 105 program, “Flavour.”

We made a Permaculture Trail for the garden which gives a short introduction to permaculture. It highlights various aspects of the garden and how they fit with permaculture principles and design. This trail can be followed around the garden with the use of QR codes or virtually online.

We won a grant for £485 from the Transition Network to have a decent Gas burner with safety certificated plumbing fitted in the hut but this has proved difficult as we fall between gas regulation brackets, We’re not a house, boat, mobile home or caravan. Such is life. We have been given permission to use the money for the cheaper solution of a camping stove and another project.

Marrying the synergy of volunteering and funding, AstraZeneca volunteers have visited and added slices of tree to our log seating - making it relatively comfortable, a mini pond and bog garden to take our hut’s roof water slowly and usefully away and erected two large garden name boards which John and Charlotte have just put the lettering on. Finally, after ten years we have a huge sign on Brookland’s Avenue advertising “Empty Common Community Garden & Hut.”


Saturday 17 August 2024

ECCG is featured on a radio programme

 



The ECCG is on Cambridge 105 radio, learn about our permaculture and hear from Rachel and the volunteers.

You can find the interview 42 minutes in - enjoy!

We need more volunteers, listen in and get in touch.

Wednesday 17 July 2024

July fun at ECCG

This summer has been challenging, we had a lot of rain so there hasn't been an urgent need for a watering rota as in previous years. In between showers we enjoyed the garden and the meeting hut, which is popular with many groups. A calendar is on the right side of this page.




On Sunday 7 July we hosted the Transition Annual Picnic. It rained just before it but we were then able to enjoy some delicious food and good conversations. The earlier downpour did have an effect on attendance, we had a bigger number of people in previous years. Thank you Anna for the photos!


Following the picnic, a dance group used the garden. They were also lucky with the weather. We are sharing this picture with permission of the people photographed.

Saturday 25 May 2024

Volunteers from AstraZeneca visit ECCG agin

An energetic and enthusiastic group of volunteers from AstraZeneca came back again on a beautiful spring day to spruce up our community garden.




They worked some magic on our seating area by putting planks on logs so they are more comfortable for guests to take a rest and admire the garden. 





They also did some paving work, helped with weeding, sowing and planting seedlings. Thank you for chosing ECCG for your volunteering day!


Tuesday 19 March 2024

Charles Dowding visits ECCG

 


On Monday 11 March, ECCG welcomed Charles Dowding, the No-Dig veg-growing expert and writer. Charlotte, volunteers, members of Transition Cambridge and our ally at the council, Public Realm Project Officer Declan, met Charles and shared tea and cake in our beautiful new hut. If you click on Charles's name, you can visit his website, which offers many useful videos. 


Charlotte showed him around and we all gained a few tips from him while sharing our love of growing with tea and cake. Declan wrote to thank Charlotte and the volunteers and quoted Margaret Mead's well known saying: "Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world; indeed it's the only thing that ever has." 

He added, recalling the early days of ECCG: "Seeing the wonderful group behind Empty Common Community Garden today was a heartwarming experience. Now with the wisdom of hindsight the empowerment of having a brilliant team (in key roles) to conceive and grow this project all those years ago, and also having important support from key figures (I could name a really important one – who stuck their neck out at the time), enabled a vision I, for one (and maybe you) could never have likely expected. If you said back then, a famous gardening TV personality would visit the unshapen boggy mess; that Andy and Rob negotiated in an unorthodox fashion – actually getting swamped in the mud at one point and having to be lifted out (!) – then I would have said you were probably barking…. But then again, we were all probably free-spirited enough, community minded and selfless to know the journey would be worth it."


We are getting ready for spring now and sowing seeds, but the soil being so wet is only just warming up and showing a few seedlings. Next week it will be time to start hoeing in earnest. Come and join us, the daffs are out and it is looking lovely. We are there every Sunday morning from 10.30 am unless it's pouring with rain!





Friday 8 March 2024

Counting down the days to spring

    

It is early March, but it's still cold and rainy at times. Today is a lovely sunny day and there are bulbs and crocuses among the grass, days are longer and birds are more active. In February we did an RSPB bird count but our volunteers only spotted two wood pigeons. It would be very different now.

John and Charlotte found an old pot-bellied stove and in this photo it is being tested before fitting.

Now it is fitted; the hut is cozy on cold days and we can boil up our tea on it. We will put some pretty tiles behind it and an outer chimney to protect our whiteboard, but it is really very close to being completely done.



Next job is to fit a gas ring properly. We have applied for a grant, so fingers crossed.

We planted six mashua last spring, a herbaceous perennial climber related to the nasturtium. Below you can see about two thirds of the harvest.They are a great groundcover too. They taste peppery when raw, but are much milder when cooked.Charlotte likes them best when roasted.




Monday 5 February 2024

Is spring coming soon?

 


On Saturday 3 February, our blogger Simone led a walk to the Empty Common Garden with members of the University of the Third Age Cambridge. The garden looks very tidy thanks to the efforts of our volunteers. The polytunnel is in order, awaiting to kickstart the growth cycle as soon as the weather permits.

We are having a few warmer days and there are early blossoms on trees and snowdrops here and there.

Our Heads, Hearts and Hands meeting hut has been busy in 2023 with various groups using it for workshops and get-togethers.

Contact Charlotte for bookings - csynge@googlemail.com - tel. 07752 143683.



A writing workshop in the meeting hut