European Environmental Education Visit

On September 8th a group of environmental education professionals from across Europe visited the farm. They were particularly interested in seeing a project just starting to get off the ground. Bosavern Community Farm is at the moment very much in the development and visionary stages of its existence.

Looking around the veggie field.

On a brief farm tour we showed them the farmyard, Home Field, veggie field, and inside the polytunnel, then fielded questions (no pun intended).

This is what an empty polytunnel looks like!

Thanks to David from Carnyorth Outdoor Environmental Education Centre for bringing them to see us. They visited several other growing projects in the area too, but ours was the only "blank canvas". Hopefully the delegates will keep an eye on this blog to see how we are progressing.

Treebogs.

Treebogs are a kind of compost toilet, and we have begun building our own here on the farm. They are a temporary wooden structure with two cubicles, and we will site them in a quiet corner behind the barn, but in easy reach of the farm buildings, yard, and Home Field.

A small group of volunteers helped us get the timber frame bolted together and ready to move into its final position, which will be sometime next month. We can then start attaching the walls and floors to the frame, and hopefully the treebogs will be up and running before long, and converting our waste into useful products like willow laths.

We took a bit of time out from treebog building to go and visit the veggie field and see how work was progressing - another lovely sunny day!

For a short video about building treebogs, please visit the Transition Penwith website www.transitionpenwith.org.uk and scroll down to "Tree Bog building Workshop", to see some of our friends sorting out their waste management system!

Volunteer days.

Before.

After.

We welcome everybody to come along to the farm to help and to learn. Volunteer days are Thursdays 10am till 3pm, and Saturdays 1 till 5pm. Just turn up! Please make sure you have sturdy footwear, clothes you don't mind getting dirty, and a packed lunch (Thursdays). Never mind if it's raining, because there are indoor tasks like planting in the polytunnel or painting the volunteer space to be done. We provide tools, gloves, training, tea and biscuits. So come along and get stuck in! For further details phone the farmhouse on 01736 788454. Last Thursday we got 12 beds in the polytunnel ready for planting, by edging them with old tiles and beams taken from the roof of our pig-shed (unfortunately it was unsafe and had to come off, but we found a use for the materials), and placing stepping stones to provide access. Some of these beds have already been sown with winter greens. These photos are of the polytunnel before and after our volunteers got to work - quite an improvement! Many thanks to all.

Getting stuck in to the tiling.

Fair for the Future.

Fair for the Future is an annual event organised by Transition Penwith, a festival with the theme being sustainability. This years fair was on Saturday 18th September. Here Alice is looking after our stall on the festival field near St. Just. Thanks to Willow for the bunting of eggs, and everyone else who helped set up the stall. Plenty of people came along and expressed their interest in the community farm. Thanks especially to those who sponsored a chicken and in doing so helped us raise money towards buying a flock of organic free-range laying hens for the farm - watch this space for further developments.

Welcome to the new blog!

Welcome everybody to the new blog of Bosavern Community Farm. This is where we'll be keeping you up to date on the continual development of the farm, both as a food producer and as a community space.