National Allotments Week theme for 2022 was Bugs, Bees and Broccoli and acknowledges the importance of gardening with nature in mind.
At Oaklands we have several areas where we have started to grow our own vegetables, herbs and salad, with the much needed guidance of those residents who were keen gardeners and have a huge amount of knowledge between them. Many discussions were had with our residents as to the benefits of Bugs in our garden. The majority agreed with the Bugslife organisation, that bugs are very important to the healthy functioning of our allotments. A lot of gardeners tend to focus on the ‘pests’ and ignore all the great work the other bugs are doing for us, but if they were not there we would miss them, be it pollinating our fruit and veg, controlling our pests or improving our soil, they are vital to healthy growing. Not only were these discussions very useful to our own garden growing, they also served as a very nice reminiscence activity, where residence chatted about their own gardens and allotments. Other residents took part in a guess the herb game by taking in the aroma of the herbs and telling us which one they thought it was, along with a lot of laughter and light-hearted conversation.
This year, we are also aiming to grow our own Christmas Dinner. Watch this space for further details!
