In our May edition find out about 'growing tales' and the exciting events happening in your local area. You might want to support the Living Landscapes project and your local community orchard, or learn a new skill.....
Events
Saturday 14th May - Taunton Vegan Fayre
11am - 3pm
North St Congregational Church, Taunton
Come along to the Taunton Vegan Fayre on Saturday 14thMay..... Taunton Transition will be there with the Free Food Map of Taunton. Come along and share your knowledge.
Food stalls, face painting, music and food demonstrations plus much more. And you don't have be vegan to try the excellent food!
Find out more..... http://www.tauntonveg.moonfruit.com/#
Uffculme Energy Fair – Saturday 21st May
With energy prices going up what can you do about it?Pop in for a fascinating glimpse into the future.... find out about solar thermal and pv, sustainable building, wind turbines and heat pumps, electric cars and local food. There will be film shows and talks.
Venue : Uffculme School
Time: 11-3
Find out more at:
https://docs.google.com/viewer?a=v&pid=explorer&chrome=true&srcid=0B4n4c73ZY0-wOTE4ZTg3OTUtYmUwOS00N2U3LTg3YjgtNzI5MzQwODllMjQ0&hl=en
Compost Loo Building Course - Saturday 21st May/Sunday 22nd May
It is a 2 day compost loo building course. The fee would normally be over £150 but it has been heavily subsidised and is therefore only £40 for the two days per person. It really is an opportunity not to be missed – and there may even be some celebratory cider involved at the end of the two days, as well as the usual excellent tea and cake!
All of the details of the course are here....https://docs.google.com/viewer?a=v&pid=explorer&chrome=true&srcid=0B4n4c73ZY0-wM2MzYjA3YmItZTAzOS00Nzc3LWI3OWEtYjE0NzY4MDg0ZGU3&hl=en.
The course will be held in woodland near Crowcombe on 21st and 22nd May (sat and sun 10 – 4.30pm). Any questions and to book, please email Louise Kennedy - louise@woodlandplaycentre.co.uk or call her on 07775 941353
There are quite a few places yet to be filled , so it might even be something for a group of people to attend together.
Transition Drop-In - Saturday 28th May
Transition Drop-In - PLANT SWAP AND GIVEWAY AND PROJECT UPDATE - Saturday 28th May
10.30-12.30
Friends Meeting House, Bath Place, Taunton
PLANT SWAP AND GIVEWAY AND PROJECT UPDATE
‘Tis that time of year when some of us find we have grown more seeds than we can possibly plant up; many are keen to swap just one or two plants to try something new; and others would love to get their hands on a few plants to stick in pots on their balcony. Bring your own surpluses to our PLANT SWAP AND GIVEAWAY, or come and see what you fancy taking home yourself.
Also, talk to folk to find out first hand some more about our two main projects: “Living Landscapes” and “Growing Tales” to see if you would like to get directly involved, or to find out if what you are already doing overlaps in some happy way. And of course, drink tea, eat cake, enjoy the sunshine!
31st May - LIVING LANDSCAPES
Following on from our brilliant Monthly Open Planning (MOP) meeting in April on the topic of Local Food, we will be working with Somerset Wildlife Trust, Project Taunton and others to help create new planting environments along the River Tone. To kick all this off, come and join us on Tuesday 31 May for a couple of events as part of SWT’s “Taunton Wildlife Week.”Drop in session at the Roots café, 10am to 12pm (on the corner of Bridge St and St James’ St). Come and talk to SWT staff and volunteers about the potential of creating a Living Landscape within the county town, in partnership with Taunton Transition Town. Add your local knowledge to the Taunton ‘free food map’; and pick up a guide for a tree “treasure hunt” walk in Goodlands Garden to find and learn about a variety of different “useful” trees we have growing right on our doorstep. (Free guides available from Roots Cafe all week).
Walk along the riverbank 1pm – 3pm. Meet at the Roots café. Join Transition Town Taunton members to explore the potential of the river corridor to be green, beautiful and bountiful. We hope to develop popular habitats for wildlife and a welcoming and pleasurable environment for people of all ages. We are thinking about planting for food – fruit and nut trees, fruit shrubs, herbs and vegetables - as well as flowers for everyone to enjoy. In this creative ideas session, we hope to identify what is already there and make suggestions for particular locations, which we can then develop further in the future with other people and groups.
MOP - Social and Project Update - Monday 13th June
We are taking it easy this month with a drink and catch-up on all the projects in the pipeline. If you still want to get involved in any of our projects - Living Landscapes, Edible Planting in Taunton, Growing Tales, Transition Together or anything else please come along for a chat.
Venue : Ring of Bells, St James St, Taunton
Time: 7.30 pm - 9.30pm
News
“Growing Tales”: TELLING OUR GREEN STORIES MORE EFFECTIVELY
MOP meeting number 2, held on Monday 9th May, has birthed a really exciting initiative that will bring together our area’s diverse green stories and make them accessible, available and inspirational. The meeting agreed that we have a vast array of sustainability success stories out there across the Deane, in businesses, schools, organisations and within the community at large. They are, however, largely hidden from each other.
We talked about how the stories we choose to tell in our culture impact on how our culture sees itself. A “critical mass” of joined up green stories could help bring sustainability into the mainstream right across the local population. We got extremely excited about using Digital Stories as a tool for capturing succinct examples of change for individuals, groups and organisations.
Digital Stories use images, recorded voices and sound to get a story across in a very powerful, “less is more” kind of way. The best can be only some 30 seconds long. As a technology it is simple to use, making it accessible in all sorts of different settings. However, it also benefits from creative input, making it perfect for collaborations involving digital artists, amateur photographers, storytellers and arts/media students. A vision emerged at the meeting where these stories are shown in a whole range of public places – at work, in schools, Doctors surgeries, places where people queue up for stuff, and of course, on the internet. Provisional title for the project: Growing Green!
If this lights your fire and you know you want to be involved, great! There will be a follow up meeting in June or early July (date tbc) open to all who are keen, but for now get in touch with Chrissie Godfrey at chrissie@visionjuice.com or by calling 01823 321731 and she will keep you in the loop.
Learning from the Land
Try your hand at learning a new skill with some great courses at Learning from the Land
28 May - How To Build A Compost Loo
Rodway Farm, Cannington - this a formal once-day course at a special price from £34 depending on eligibility
(see link at Bridgwater College http://www.bridgwater.ac.uk/features-item.php?fid=710)
14 June - Rainwater Harvesting - learn how to make the most of our precious resources by gathering rainwater and redirecting it for your own use. See website below for full details.
9 July - Pointing a Wall for Beginners - a chance for you to save money by learning how to repoint a traditional garden or outside wall. Useful for anyone with outbuildings, sheds or garden walls of stone. See website below for full details.
26 June - OPEN AFTERNOON 2-5pm - The Power of Water - a fun-packed afternoon for all the family with activites all around water, water recycling, water power and water filtering...more details soon.
Find out at www.learningfromtheland.co.uk
Frieze Hill Community OrchardWant to support your local community and share in the produce of your work, then join the Frieze Hill Community Orchard. The orchard has been planted to provide edible trees for everyone and provides a wonderful wildlife habitat as well. You can find out all about the orchard here: http://www.communityorchard.org.uk/
Save the Bees!
Help the Cornwall Bee Keepers experiment to get stronger british bees to fight the veroa virus.
Please go to
http://www.co-operative.coop/join-the-revolution/cornwall-bee-improvement-and-bee-breeders-group
and vote for this proposal.
See http://www.kilty.demon.co.uk/beekeeping/improvement.htm to see what
they are up to.
Please also send an email to all your friends asking them to vote for it.
I believe it is essential that we do what we can to help honeybees
survive the various challenges facing them from viruses now as a result of the parasitic varroa mite to future threats such as the small hive beetle and a small more virulent mite. By looking carefully for signs that the bees are removing varroa from the adult and pupal bees, we can hopefully breed these characters into our bees, even though this is going to take time and effort. We have some encouraging signs after a few years work and are optimistic that working together will make this happen. James Kilty
Our mission is the provision of land, buildings and related services in accordance with co-operative principles for the benefit of the community in Somerset in order to:
- reduce inequality and social exclusion in housing
- provide workspace for community enterprise
You can invest in the society with small investments - Somerset residents can subscribe with as little as 100 £1 shares. However larger sums will enable them to do more. The bulk of the funds that are raised will be invested in bricks and mortar and will be able to compensate investors with regular interest returns.
- create sustainable buildings and enhance the built environment
If you are interested in finding out more download this leaflet.... https://docs.google.com/viewer?a=v&pid=explorer&chrome=true&srcid=0B4n4c73ZY0-wZjdlMmVhOWItMTdjMy00ZWQxLTg4ZTMtZWZkODkzNWVmZGY2&hl=en
or write directly to: Somerset CCLT, 12 North Street, Stoke Sub Hamdon, TA14 6QP. You can contact them on 0845 458 1473 or email on landtrust@somerset.coop
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