We're trying to encourage as many public healthcare sites as possible to bring back hospital orchards and take up our fully funded fruit tree offer. To help us do this, we want to understand what else you need to know about planting food-producing trees. What barriers are you facing? What opportunities do we not know about yet?
To learn more, read the Green Space for Health team's latest blog on how healthcare sites can help combat food insecurity, support healthier diets, promote biodiversity and encourage healthier, more social communities through planting food-producing trees and orchards.
I love this idea but I know there is always the question with any tree planting about how the cost of ongoing maintenance will be funded. do the trees come with knowledge of how to maintain to continue production? This could help scope out future costs. From a gardening perspective, i know having to grass cut around trees increases time and costs. Can't be completed with sit on lawn mower.
I agree with Collette on this. And with my horticulturalists hat on.
My local council planted 3 'mini Community Orchards' (cherry & apple) my nearest on the edge of a football public field/football pitch. Most trees are alive, 3 years later, some got damaged/vandalised. Labels have been lost. As far as I know the other 2 are completely unmaintained (fruit trees need annual care to be productive)
My nearest I've tried to maintain with pruning, but its hard to identify in the winter when most (not cherry) pruning is done.
Grass on these fields is a ride on 'tractor' mower.
I can't see many NHS ground sites contractors doing 'fruit tree pruning' as a specific job.
Unless perhaps the trees are added to an area that includes hort/skills therapy workshops etc. And again, where's the funding coming from?
Another project I'v supported is still undoing damage on a 50 year old community orchard that's had little care apart from the occasional 'council cut'
Maybe networking with charities such as Sustain might bring solutions.
Hi Colette and James,
We are running online training sessions with The Orchard Project around orchard planting, care and maintenance. We appreciate that this only goes so far but have made this set of introductory recordings requisite watching for those applying & they also receive detailed resources packs.
We recommended semi vigorous root stock and that the trees be planted together- so they don’t get forgotten about planted individually. By planting the trees together we hope that orchards become a feature of the NHS site for potential seasonal activity and promote tree maintenance be possibly undertaken as part of seasonal NBIs.
By encouraging planting trees in grid formation, they mimic, traditional orchards which are structurally and ecologically like wood-pasture, which has huge ecological benefits from when meadow grows beneath. However, as the tree spacing (recommended at 3.5m - 4.5m between trees) is wider than typical tree planting, it should also be easier to mow between when required.
We have introduced NHS Forest volunteer matching service, with the hope that this may help sites with green space maintenance and we are also looking for sites to partner with the probation service for more regular help.
Despite this we recognise the perennial problem faced by sites with estate maintenance and associated costs and have provided this feedback and learning to our funder. We continue to seek further funding that would support these maintenance costs as we consider the future direction of NHS Forest.
Thank you!
Hattie
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