Wassail Went Well!

It went more than well - it was amazing! We had, at a very rough head count, over 50 people (including lots of children) in the Village Hall for the lantern making workshop, and about double that number at the Wassail celebration itself.

We learned a lot about lanterns (you'll have to excuse the alliteration, folks, I am on a poetry writing course and it's getting to me!) and we also learned that glittery little stars look beautiful and get absolutely everywhere - we had a lot of sweeping up to do. I also realised that I am not cut out for a career as a pyrotechnician; I was lightng tealights to glow out from paper bags, one by each apple tree - I managed to set light to the bag four times.

I am sure that everyone who turned up enjoyed it; everywhere I looked in the dusk I could see smiling faces and hear hearty singing of the Cambridge Wassail song. It was like going back in time, or at least reaching out from the present to the past, awaking an old folk memory.

Christmas tidings and new year

Well, as I sit and write this my garden looks more like Lapland than East Anglia, but I know that under all that snow the apple trees in my garden, and those in the Orchard, are already thinking about spring.

So in order to get them off to a good start, we shall be thinking of their spiritual welfare, as well as their physical nourishment - and give them a Wassail, a blessing, specially for trees.

Our Orchard Wassail has grown in numbers of attendees and enthusiasm each year, as the trees themselves grow taller; even deep snow last year did not stop us. What the weather will bring this year, who can say, but we will be there!

We have added even more drama to the event - we are going to hold it at dusk, and start off with a lantern procession. I am so excited about this, our first event of 2011.

Sunday 9 January 2011 Lantern Making Workshop and Wassail

11am - 12:30pm in the Village Hall, Trumpington. Come along and build your own lantern from tissue paper and willow. Decorate it how you like, and you can use it later in the day.
£3 per family, all materials included.

4pm - bring your lovely lantern, or any other light that you have, and join our procession from the Allotment shed to the Community Orchard. On site there will be musicians, singing, dancing (to keep out the cold) and hot spiced apple juice. We will toast the trees and wish them, and us, all good fortune for 2011. Admission to the Wassail is free, donations appreciated. Just turn up and join in.

I do hope you can come along it's going to be spectacular.

Apple Days 2010

It's been quiet on this blog, but, like a beehive, all the work has been going on inside where it can't be seen.

We've shut up the observation beehive for the winter, and decided to hold the opening ceremony in the spring instead. So much nicer for the humans and the bees.

I note that Henry in Gloucestershire has written a wonderful article on the fragility of orchards - find it at http://www.scribd.com/doc/36252878/Final-Version and do have a look at his blog (see the menu on the right) Henry I don't know how you find the time, but keep it up!

Meanwhile, we have been planning a rather special talk:
Friday 15th October
in the Trumpington Pavilion on Byron Square/Foster Road
7:30pm - doors open from 7pm
Tickets £2 on the door

Gavin Maclennan from the Brogdale Fruit Collection is giving a talk on Cambridgeshire apples and orchards. He will bring examples of local varieties, so that we can see what our trees should be producing when they are fully grown.

I hope to see lots of apple fans at this event - please support us!

Adopt a bee for 20p

That's our current campaign. We are raising funds for the upkeep and maintenance of our new observation hive.

Dave, our resident beekeeper, has written this to explain what is going on in the hive at the moment:

"The observation hive contains three frames. Two of these were introduced to the hive with both brood, larvae and eggs on them. One is a standard brood frame, the other is a super frame of the type normally used to store honey in. Within three days the bees should have turned one or more of the cells the larvae are in into queen cells in order to raise a queen. Following the egg hatching within five and a half days the cell will be capped with wax. After another eight days the queen will emerge. She reaches maturity after a further sixteen days following which she will go on her mating flight. If the weather is bad this may be delayed. The queen will then commence laying eggs herself.Because the colony has been established late in the season it may not be strong enough to survive the winter.

The hive will be opened on maintenance days, when the weather is warm and a beekeeper is in attendance. We are also planning an 'official opening' of the hive on Sunday 12 September at 11am.

In the meantime, if you want to adopt a bee, or several, we can accept cash at our maintenance sessions or events, or cheques through the post. I am looking at electronic methods, but as we don't have a Charity nunber most of these won't work for us. All ideas welcomed!

Bugs, bird houses and bees

I know, this site has been very quiet, but please don't think that we have been dozing in the orchard while Spring turned, reluctantly, into Summer. We've been holding events, running stalls, and on the orchard itself we've been installing an observation beehive. This is one of those tall thin hives with glass sides, so that we can show the inner workings of the hive to interested groups.

We've been out campaigning about the importance of bees, especially to orchards. We had a stall at the Cambridge Environment Festival on Lammas Land - it was a well-attended day, and a good opportunity to meet other green groups, as well as members of the public.

Then we organised a bug hunt for 19 June - but that was the weekend it was really, really cold, and not suprisingly the bugs and most of the visitors stayed at home. The Mayor of Cambridge, Councillor Sheila Stuart, came along, and met the visitors we did have, so thanks to her for including us in her busy schedule.

I wasn't at the bug hunt myself - I was at the Swavesey Village Fete, giving demonstrations on how to make bird houses from carrier bags. I was in a marquee, so I escaped the rain, but I was just as cold

Nest weekend, Saturday 3 July, we shall be at the Fawcett School Fete (12pm - 4pm) with our stall, plus a game to play and a chance to 'adpot a bee for 20p' so come and see us and join in the fun.

What on Earth? for National Science Week

It's National Science and Engineering Week from Friday 12th to 21st March. There are lots of events across the country, but if you can't get to any you can still take part. Just step into your garden - or your nearest community orchard - and photograph a minibeast (an insect, bug or worm), a funghi or even a bird. If you can't identify it, there are experts on the What on Earth site who will do that for you, once you've shared your photo on the gallery. Their site says:

What on Earth is a call-to-action to identify as many plants and animals as possible in UK parks, gardens and hedgerows. Go outside and reconnect with all the weird and wonderful flora and fauna that inhabit our small but diverse land.
Upload a photo of anything you dont recognise and in return we'll try our best to identify it and send you a free packet of seeds* designed to encourage more creatures to inhabit your local space *(subject to availability), in addition to a Biodiversity Information and Activity Pack. Whether its plant identification, bird identification, animal identification or funghi identification - we'll do our best to find out what on earth it is!

We are going to hold a minibeast hunt as part of Cambridge Environment Week in June so why not compare what you find next week with what you find then? Don't forget to record where and when you took the picture, and what the weather was like.

Merci Beaucoup, Raymond

Raymond Blanc's programme on BBC2 last night (Monday 1 March ) was all about apples. In between some lovely, and some not so lovely recipes (salmon poached in oil, served with apples soaked in oil? erm non, merci...), was a succinct demonstration of the art of grafting, given by William Sibley. Raymond learned how to graft a Jonagold onto a Bramley, in an effort to increase pollination of the Bramley.

Raymond and William also tasted their way systematically through many different varieties - although sadly there was no information given on each, or even the names of most of them, and there are no further details on the website. However the programme did draw attention to the huge variation in texture, taste and acidity within apples, and noted that some may be better stewed than raw, or baked rather than stewed. I have a Kentish Fillbasket tree at home, and as soon as it's apple time again I shall be making those apple souffles, but they will come out about 3 times the size of Raymond's dainty desserts.

You can watch the programme on the BBC site for the next month.

Raymond writes further about all the suppliers for Le Manoir in this Guardian article

Sadly I can't find any further information about William - perhaps he would like to get in touch? I would love to learn more from his expertise.