Shoebox Garden Competition – Individual Category Results

We are delighted to announce the winner of the ‘Individual’ category of the Garden Shoebox competition is Grace Matheson (age 7). 🤩 Grace’s garden is based on a beach theme and features carrot, nasturtium and lobelia plants – all grown from seed! Grace upcycled lots of things from in and around her house and beach to make the garden, including: lollypop sticks to make the bench, a cotton reel for a table, and sweetie wrappers to make cushions! Brilliant work!

Runners up were: Rosie Gollings (age 10), also with a beach themed garden, and Aiden Campbell (pictured), with his ‘Wild Garden’ inspired by the croft he lives on (featuring chives, and a drawbridge for the animals to get in and out).

We had lots of great entries into the individual competition but there can only be one winner (and 2 runner-ups)! Thanks to all the other children who entered. A great job by everyone – the judges were impressed!

Shoebox Garden 2022

Our annual Shoebox Garden competition is now open. For more details click on the link: Shoebox Garden 2022 

Guest Pod – Bonnymuir Green Community Trust

Our latest Guest Pod features Bonnymuir Green Community Trust.
 
Our final Tattie Day of 2022 was held at Bonnymuir Green – visitors who hadn’t been before were amazed with all it has to offer – including a cafe, outside sitting area, bees, pick your own fruit and vegetables and a pond. Click on the link to find out more – well worth a visit! 🙂

Congratulations Bob!

We are delighted to say that OSF’s Bob Donald received a Certificate of Merit from The Caley (Royal Caledonian Horticultural Scociety) at their 2022 Annual Awards Ceremony last night, in recognition of his services to gardening/ horticulture. Totally deserved – well done Bob!

Bob was nominated by the OSF Team – you can read the statements in support of Bob’s nomination below.

Summary of contribution to gardening or horticulture in Scotland

Bob’s contribution is outstanding. In an entirely voluntary capacity, he:

  • established (in 2017), chairs and drives forward the voluntary organisation One Seed Forward (OSF) in the north-east (NE) of Scotland
  • subsequently, in partnership with the University of Aberdeen, helped develop the OSF Garden Schools programme which he takes a lead role in promoting and driving forward – encouraging schools to establish F&V gardens, and to introduce and engage pupils with growing through a programme of engaging materials
  • jointly works the OSF community allotment, demonstrating the F&V which can be grown successfully in the NE – he encourages people to visit to see what’s going on, to learn, and to get involved
  • champions heritage varieties (particularly of potatoes!) through annual OSF free seed potato giveaways – manning stalls, giving advice and encouragement to first-time and other growers
  • promotes an eco-friendly and organic approach to growing
  • endlessly networks and fosters working relationships with a wide range of partners including other voluntary groups and charities, schools, community groups, as well as local health and social care partnerships – promoting the value and benefits of ‘growing your own’, and offering advice and support to get started through the work of OSF
  • takes a hands-on approach, physically helping people and groups including building vegetable gardens and raised beds

 

Describe how the person you are nominating stands out from others and why they deserve special recognition

Apart from his love of all things potato (!), Bob stands out from others as a result of his TOTAL dedication and drive to further the work of OSF, encouraging and supporting all ages to grow their own. Not bad for someone who confesses he previously had no interest in gardening or growing!

Always in quiet command, Bob has tireless energy, passion, enthusiasm and commitment in moving forward the work of OSF. He leads from the front both coming up with ideas, and then happily ‘getting his hands dirty’ doing the work involved. Equally he is more than happy to listen to other people’s ideas and to support putting them into action. He always retains a sense of humour, is open-minded and inclusive. Despite being hugely busy he will always find time to have a chat or offer advice and support when anyone needs.

 

Spring ’22 Newsletter

Our Spring ’22 Newsletter is available now!

Grow Tatties Booklet

We are delighted to let you know about our brand new booklet ‘Grow Tatties’ – aimed at new and less experienced growers.

Free copies (along with seed potatoes, vegetable seeds, and some flower seeds) are available at our March Give Away events – now’s your chance to ‘Get Growing’!

For more information visit our Seed Potatoes web page.

OSF Potato Project

Growing potatoes in the NE of Scotland in 2022? If the answer is yes, would you like to help us with our Citizen Scientist type project? We want know what varieties of potatoes you’re growing this year, and how well they grow. For more details check out the Potato Project page.

Free Seeds!

As well as giving away FREE seed potatoes at our March events we’ll also be giving away a range of FREE vegetable and flower seeds.

These giveaways are possible thanks to a number of individuals and organisations who have generously donated seeds to OSF.

Visit our Seed Giveaway page for more information.

Tattie Days 2022

All dates for our free seed tattie giveaways are now confirmed. More information on individual events coming very soon – keep an eye on our Facebook page! 😀

Please note, sadly Seedy Sunday in Mintlaw (due to be held on 13th March) has been cancelled as a result of storm damage. 🥺

Climate Action Award

Excited to launch our new Climate Action Award this week, in partnership with Garden Organic and Wild Wales Seeds! A free pack is available to support this initiative – see our schools website for details: Climate Action Award – OSF Garden Schools 🙂