Zero Mile Gardens

17/01/2025

Progress on the tunnel this week... Hoops and door frames up. Thanks to everyone who helped on this this week, Emily with her spirit level, Mark with all his tools and smile, and Marco for the daily panettone delivery!

13/01/2025

Thank you for your interest. So nice to see the workshops fully booked, but also fee sorry there is no space for everyone...

12/01/2025

Really nice to see everyone again at St Thomas community Garden, and the sun!

A good harvest of Jerusalem artichokes. The lamb lettuce is doing well too. Tender and delicate.

10/01/2025

Exciting webinar coming up with DWT : how to grow vegs while supporting wildlife. Just what we want to do!! 🐛

Join us for our next winter webinar as we explore biodiversity and allotments—can we truly grow vegetables while supporting wildlife?

We’ll be joined by two fantastic speakers:

🌼 Becky Searle (Sow Much More) – Ecologist, botanist, gardener, and social media influencer. Becky will share how she’s creating a thriving haven for wildlife in her own garden.

🌱 Becky Wells – From the St Thomas Allotment Association, Becky will introduce their exciting “Biodiversity Boost” project, aimed at supporting and enriching wildlife while growing food in allotments.

🗓 When: 14th January
💻 Where: Online

✨ Whether you’re an experienced grower or just starting out, come along and discover how we can grow food and nurture nature side by side!

Book here 👉 https://buff.ly/40n8QgJ

08/01/2025

A new magazine for our neighbourhoods. I'll be at the pre-launch meeting and writing on food growing and community gardening in the April issue 🥕

Take a look at our latest sample magazine at westoftheriver.org/sample

We'll be starting work on the 'real thing' in February.

Want to get involved? Then come along to our Pre-launch meeting on Tuesday 21st January 2025 6:30-8PM
at Theatre Alibi, Emmanuel Rd, EX4 1EJ (off Okehampton Rd)

Download the poster for this event at
https://bit.ly/wotr-pre-launch-poster

07/01/2025

Such a beautiful day to get the ground ready for the polytunnel ! Many thanks to Benji (and all your expertise! couldn't have done without), Marco, Jacek, and Alasdair for the wonderful help and company.

We were done by lunchtime, enjoying a cuppa and various tasty things. Lovely to see Coco, Nina, and Chilli, chilling in the sun.

The polytunnel was delivered by Ferryman tunnel in the afternoon and supported by an Award for All Grant. Thank you for the support !

See you all again on Thursday for step 2 : putting the polytunel up 😊

06/01/2025

HAPPY NEW YEAR EVERYONE !

We'll start the year installing our polytunnel (to grow veg seedlings and herbs). We'll be installing it this week and (due to some of our helpers' illness) would quite like a bit of help tomorrow with some digging, shovelling, wheelbarrowing; and on Thursday to erect the tunnel.

We'll start at 9.30 at Emmanuel Hall EX41EJ. I'll bring a bit of lunch to share. We would need just one or two persons ; please message me to let me know if you can make it!

27/12/2024

Another amazing project to look forward to in 2025 !

Happy New Year everyone 🤩🦎🦔🐝

Cowick Lane allotment tenant, Becky Wells, shows you how to make a simple pond to attract beneficial wildlife to your allotment plot.You may already know abo...

19/12/2024

An exciting free online workshop coming up in the New Year! https://www.tickettailor.com/events/cagsomerset/1499493

Our own workshop series is now fully booked for January-March 2025. We'll organise a new series in near future!

Wishing you all a joyful festive season and a very happy new year 🎄✨

This is a free online session for CAG Devon and CAG Somerset members to inspire conversations around community composting, shar...

05/12/2024

🫖🥧☕St Thomas Library, Emmanuel Hall, EX4 1EJ, 12 December 2024 11.30-12.30

If you've missed our launch at Love Food CIC, or if you just want to come and see us again, or grab a copy of the book or a cuppa, here is our last event of the year : a cosy book presentation at St Thomas Library - Exeter to learn about St Thomas Community Garden's work and the stories behind our recipe book.

It includes 16 recipes featuring some of the garden's produce written by garden's volunteers and local food businesses including Love Food CIC, One Mile Bakery Exeter, Apple blossom deli, .exeter, and cooks at Shillingford Organics café.

We hope to see some of you there 🙂🫖☕🥧

04/12/2024

Another interesting Webinar coming up soon...

Does food growing and wildlife habitat have to be in competition? Or, can our limited urban green spaces support both food and nature?

03/12/2024

A few pics from our workshop last Saturday on Setting Up and Running a Community Garden. Many thanks to all the participants who made it such a rich and stimulating event. Thanks to and for hosting, to for the pictures, and for funding through the Growing Communities Fund.

We still have a few places for the next workshop in our series on Permaculture Design, with Tess Wilmot from on 25 January. Do get in touch to book your space.

23/11/2024

We have a few spare seeds from the garden to go in the bank!

Spring along and donate your spare seeds to the Exeter Seed Bank, now at St Thomas Library. Why not pick up a gardening book whilst your here? Remember, we are doing FREE reservations at St Thomas Library, so take your pick from the extensive range of gardening books we hold in our libraries across Devon. Next year, look out for the “Seed Swap” that Exeter Seed Bank will be running on 2nd March, 2025, at Positive Lights in Sidwell Street, Exeter.

21/11/2024

We have a few places left for our workshop on Community Growing next week.
Just email or message us to book your space 🙂❄️☀️🌿

20/11/2024

Happening tomorrow !

FREE webinar, Thurs 21st Nov!
Hear about some of the initiatives that are creating the conditions for urban and peri-urban agroecology to thrive in the UK.
For anyone interested in influencing the policies and practices that shape our food system.
Book:
https://www.tickettailor.com/events/urbanagricultureconsortium/1436458

18/11/2024

Checking on the cuttings we did a few weeks ago. They look pretty happy, and they'll go on our stall in a few months 🌱

15/11/2024

That's this time of year, the ground covered in leaves, and we'll collect them to mulch our beds in St Thomas pleasure ground and do some leafmould (tucked away in bags behind our Scotty's Hot boxes 🍁🍂

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