Jenny Smith, my clever cousin (of Jenny’s Bothy fame), had the bright idea to start the Forres Incredible Edibles project. She was the enthusiast who wanted to encourage folk attending The Living Well group in the church hall to begin taking an interest in growing their own super healthy food.

After she passed away in 2020 I knew it was really important to somehow keep her vision flourishing. Since Incredible Edibles had to close down when the old Castle Hill church was sold, I started the St. Leonard’s Community Garden Project. Although St Leonard’s grow box area is a rather smaller venture, and not so visible to the public, it is, none the less, really worthwhile.

St Leonard's grow boxesThere’s a Loving Aliveness flowing through this whole community garden project with the result that not only the grow boxes are bursting with green and, at times, flowering abundance but what was just ‘sterile‘ gravel has now become full of pollinator-loving volunteer plants … seeded by birds, wind and serendipity!

The wooden grow boxes were put together for the community to benefit from, and in the last 6 years I’ve been more or less growing for passers-by, other locals and myself … to help ourselves to whatever’s ripe and takes our fancy. The pop-up pantry in the Town Hall on a Friday afternoon gets some produce when there’s enough … together with a couple of handfuls of sweet smelling herbs.

St Leonard's grow boxes photo Romany Buck

So this has been my baby!! … working as and when I’m free and, of course, when I feel an urgent call from The Garden Deva.🧚🏼🍀Occasionally I need a friend to help, so I put the word out. Most of the time I’m rather content just pottering in my own time.

Now compost is my great joy and co-creative ploy! I spread my delicious multi-organism compost early in the spring and it’s a mix of the following

  • Veggie plants and herb waste (not seeded or rooted wild plants) from the beds
  • Kitchen waste (NOT avocado shells or stones, citrus, cooked food, skins of melon, squash etc)
  • Fresh horse poo from Equus riding centre
  • Seaweed from Hopeman
  • Cardboard and brown paper
  • Seaweed water
  • Rockdust if I can source it
  • Leaf mould and tree bark from Cluny Hill
  • Human Pee … diluted

I reckon one of the secrets of good, well rotted compost is to reduce the size of the elements, mentioned above, into small components. So I chop stuff pretty small. There are of course copious worms multiplying like mad! (if I spot a blackbird on the search to feed their young then I’ll offer it a few!) There are also slugs of a kind that are brilliant at breaking down old matter too.

Last year was a bumper compost year for this garden with about six sacks produced of very rich and productive ‘growing medium’ … all homemade and full of life to reactivate the soil in all the boxes.

Of course there’s been loads of rain and this is just perfect so I’ve done less watering, though at the beginning of the season I did give the boxes a lot of water deep down in order to ‘wake up’ the soil and all the living bacteria … just waiting to spring into life!