When one pupil from St Egwins School was asked "What is the Youth Challenge"?, she replied that it was taking part in activities that are both new and take them out of their 'comfort zone'... I have no idea whether they went out of their 'comfort zone'; they all looked very comfortable to me and worked together well.  However, they all did some new activities and seemed to enjoy themselves.

During week 1, they went for a walk on the farm, picked some wheat, which was left on the side of the field, and some buckwheat, then visited the chickens to collect eggs. When they returned to the meeting rooms, they separated the seeds from the chaff, ground some wheat to make flour and then made some Scotch pancakes. Some were made from their wholemeal flour and some with white flour bought from the shops.  Both types were enjoyed and there was not a clear preference!

On week 2, the pupils were given a challenge.  In pairs, they had to make up a bird box from the kit they were given.  They had no instructions, but were shown a completed one to look at.  The kit consisted of 6 pieces of wood which were labelled, a hammer, nails, tacks and roof felt. It was very interesting watching and listening to their thought processes.  With very few mistakes, they all completed the challenge and produces excellent boxes. Next week, they will decorate them and take them back to school to put up for the spring.  They also made some bird feeders out of logs which they drilled large holes in and stuffed with a fat/seed/flour mixture. 

With slight reluctance, we picked all the tomatoes today and pulled up the plants.  We cannot complain, they have given up bucket loads of tomatoes - 16 different varieties. With our harvest of green tomatoes, we will make green tomato chutney - any other suggestions greatly received! 

We saved some seed from our favourite varieties... these include Rosella, Green Zebra, Red Zebra, German orange strawberry, Black crim, an unknown orange cherry and a yellow cherry! Last year, I had some success this way.  All I did was to spread the seeds on a piece of kitchen roll and left them to dry. When it was time to sow the seeds, I simply placed the sheet on a seed tray of compost and sprinkled some soil on top. I was delighted when loads of plants came up!  Fingers crossed for next year.  Having had so many varieties next to each other, I am sure that we may end up with some odd mixtures! Watch this space!

In preparation for pupils who are coming to the farm for their Youth Challenge, we made some bird box kits and made up some ourselves.  We had fun as we sawed, drilled holes and hammered in nails... not always in the right place!   Some laughs were had but in the end, we were pleased with the results.

Thank you everyone.  We raised £1040!  Fantastic effort. Well done!

We had a wonderful day.  All our hopes were surpassed.  Thanks to all of you who came and supported the event and contributed so generously to Macmillan.  

We started at 10am serving coffee or tea with cakes, scones, and biscuits.  There were lots of plants, jams, chutneys, lavender bags and produce.  Tomatoes, courgettes, beans and apples were bought enthusiastically. Many people commented on how much they enjoyed drinking from lovely antique china cups.  These were generously lent by Ruth Phillips whose business "Emily's Best" hires out boxes of vintage china for events. 

After a break at lunch time, we opened again for afternoon tea.  More cakes arrived and lots were eaten or bought.  Many people attempted to guess the weight of the cake.  The nearest guess was 3lb 15 oz by one of our volunteers.  It was just over that 3lb 15.5oz.  

We could not have run the event without help.  Jo and Isobel are so grateful to Jean, Janet, Denise, Howard, Emily, Sue, Tracy, Mima, Emily, Malcolm and William.  But also thanks to everyone who brought things to buy, including the Wick Gardening club who gave us all the plants left over from their stall at Wick Fete.  

We are now looking forward and planning for our next one. Watch this space!

September has been a glorious month.  The warm temperatures have meant that our vegetables have just kept on growing and the tomato plants have produced a bumper harvest. We picked kilos of damsons and some blackberries as well.  We have some new farm helpers and some volunteers. It has been a happy and productive time. 

Our lawn has finally grown enough to be mown.  We have been feeding the vegetables on a very smelly mixture made from nettles and comfrey.  It seems to have done the trick... Our tomatoes are growing like mad and so are the courgettes, runner beans and salad. 

The summer has been good for viewing butterflies and bees.  We attempted the butterfly count and did other pollinator surveys as part of the citizen science project.  However, we weren't so pleased to see the numbers of white butterfly caterpillars on our nasturtium leaves!  There were 100s of them.  We removed them by hand, but they were very persistent.

There is nothing more satisfying than eating lunch that we have grown ourselves! Salad,eggs and carrots.  More to come...

Wildlife Detectives

On a boiling hot day in July, we hosted the first of the wildlife detective days for younger children. The pond was teeming with life and each scoop of the net showed us the variety of creatures living there.  The margins were lovely and we found crickets, beetles, butterflies and flies.  In the afternoon, dens were built and a tea party hosted many animals...

Explorer Day

Much laughter and discussion went on as a group of mixed aged children used maps, compasses and instructions to find their way around various checkpoints on the farm.  They ground up wheat to make flour and produced some delicious pancakes.  Finally, some head dresses were made and a scarecrow built.  She has become quite the star of the farm ever since.

Survival Day

There is nothing like building fires.... Tom gave a demonstration and discussed  various ways of making fire and managed to light an 'Alfred cake' with a magnifying glass very quickly. A group of children explored the farm to find suitable wood, tinder and kindling and built some very good fires. They made damper bread, cooked and ate it with homemade butter and jam.  Some of them were patient to make delicious bread... others produced more stodgy efforts... but all seemed to enjoy the process!   After lunch, some made sculptures and others made wind chimes with natural materials.

June and July was a very busy month for school visits. Several schools came for repeat visits and we had a couple for the first time.  The weather was wonderful and I began to plan the days assuming we could be outside the whole time... 

June is always an exciting time to look for mini-beasts in the margins; using traps, nets, trays and pooters we found, caught and identified a fantastic variety of creatures. It was very satisfying.  We also did several pollinator surveys around this time.  On one occasion, we counted 7 different types of bees and 3 different hoverflies on one small patch of comfrey.  The pond was also a great success.  I was constantly amazed at how many different things we found in it.

Another common theme in our visits was growing food. One school planted some vegetables and salad in May and were able to return in July to pick, cook and eat them. We had a scrumptious lunch of new potatoes, carrots, beans and salad along with pancakes made with eggs they collected from our chickens.  Children enjoyed  using compasses and maps to navigate their way around a trail on the farm and picking things on their way.   We used the flowers and other natural materials to be creative; I particularly liked the head dresses produced on a couple of the visits.

Bob Slater from The Campaign for the Farmed Environment (CFE) hosted a pollinator event at Wick Grange Farm. After a meeting at lunchtime, Tom took a group of farmers and representatives from Syngenta, Kings Crops and Cotswold Seeds around the flower margins and recently planted field corners to show what can be achieved to encourage pollinators.