THANK YOU TO GOLD LABEL
Little Growers would like to say a huge thank you to Gold Label Substrates, they kindly donated eight tonnes of compost to us for our up and coming Co-operative Pilot Scheme. This has enabled us to set up three schools in the local area with numerous raised beds to grow produce to supply the community and local co-operative store. Crawley Ridge and Connaught school will have 32 square metres of growing space each, with Bagshot School having 34 square metres of raised beds. The soil has now been delivered to all schools and we will be installing the growing projects throughout the month of May, with each school having a ‘Grow Day’ where parents and volunteers come along and help to set up the raised beds, irrigation systems and plants so that the children are ready for the summer. Watch this space for more news on the Co-operative and Little Growers pilot scheme which we informed you of in more detail in the last newsletter.
Up and coming Nutritional advice
Little Growers is pleased to announce we are now working in partnership with Fig Tree Nutrition to provide nutritional information about the produce which is used in our school growing projects. We will be creating a variety of learning resources for both teachers and students to utilise, with information about balanced diets, what crops to grow for specific vitamins and minerals and much more. Amanda Cleghorn who runs Fig Tree Nutrition is a qualified nutritional therapist, based in Chobham and Weybridge, Surrey who provides tailored nutritional advice for adults and children. Nutritional therapy aims to promote optimal health and can be effective in addressing a wide range of health issues, including digestive problems, skin complaints, weight loss, hormonal imbalances, behavioural issues, low energy and poor bone health. We are currently putting together the content for the learning resources and will soon be working with our graphic designer to have them ready for uploading to our learning section of the website. In the meantime to see what we already have within this section please visit: http://www.littlegrowers.co.uk/all-about-little-growers/downloads
For more information on Figtree please visit: http://www.figtreenutrition.co.uk/
Points mean prizes
The Little Growers Online Interactive Community is going from strength to strength, with more and more schools updating photos and blogs detailing their gardening projects. We are excited to see increasing numbers of schools joining and sharing their growing experiences with us. We have recently welcomed new schools from the UK, Sri Lanka and the Maldives. Please click on the following link to have a look for yourself at all their great work:
Each time a school updates their profile with photos and text they are rewarded with points. They can then use these points to gain free horticultural equipment from Little Growers. Two schools have recently gained enough points to gain equipment, Hillbourne and Manor High are both deciding which equipment they would like and then Little Growers will send them out their rewards, so they can develop their growing projects even further. There are some brilliant growing stories and school gardening projects to be seen on our Online Interactive Community so please do take a look and if you are a school, please do join us and create your own profile to begin telling your own story and earn points and prizes!
Kitchen Garden Magazine
Little Growers were recently visited by Kitchen Garden Magazine to begin writing an article on our Co-operative Pilot scheme. They will be visiting us throughout the growing season to document Bagshot School’s progress, showing how simple the AutoPot irrigation systems are and the great results Little Growers have been having in our local area of Surrey.
As you can see from the photographs everyone involved had a fun filled afternoon, using both the AQUAbox spyders which Little Growers provides for raised bed irrigation and the pot and tray systems which we use in the school polytunnels. We will be updating you on the projects throughout this summer and will be uploading the finished article onto the website as soon as it published, so keep an eye out for much more in the coming months.
Little Growers at Facebook
Little Growers is now up and running on Facebook, please do join our group to be updated with news, photos and more from the Little Growers team.
To see what we are up to please follow this link to our Facebook Page
Best Wishes and Happy Growing,
Heather Pearl – Project Manager
heather@littlegrowers.co.uk