Who Are Growing Newbury Green?
Growing Newbury Green was formed in 2012 after founder member Jeremy Gorbold suggested growing fruit trees on open spaces and parks in Newbury. With the agreement of Newbury Town Council we planted our first orchard at Barn Crescent that year and kept going from there! We now have over 60 apple trees in several sites around the town and awaiting our first major harvest any year now.
Alongside that we branched (sorry) out to filling shopping trolleys with herbs and lettuces and displaying them around town to publicise the Newbury In Bloom competition and in 2018 had a larger raised bed sited on Lock Island by the canal to try out a more substantial planting of crops - have a look at the photos further down this page.
We want to make more free food available in the town - it'll be local, fresh and an asset to the community over the coming years. Please join us on this growing journey.
Harvest Events 2024
This year we have three sites with a decent crop of apples, so we are running 3 harvest events during September as the fruit ripens.
Sunday 15th Sept 2pm at City Recreation Ground orchard, off Andover Road near St Barts school
Saturday 21st Sept at 11am at Sayers Close orchard in Greenham (on land between Sayers Close and Equine Way).
Note: if coming by car the best parking is in Equine Way on the Tesco's side of the site.
and Thursday 26th Sept at 5pm - Barn Crescent, off Elizabeth Avenue. An after-school early evening event.
We have done some test tasting of the crop and the apples do need another couple of weeks to fully ripen, so don't be tempted to pick them now. Wind falls are fine to use, but they are best for cooking.
At Barn Crescent we have 2 trees of Winston apples at the Middle Way end of the site that are not ripe until the end of October, so they need to left even longer, but are great for a Christmas crop.
You can download the flyer here
Grafting and Pruning 2024
At the end of February we were delighted to welcome Tim Andrews from Orchard Revival, to Newbury for our first ever tree grafting workshop. Several local green groups were able to tackle tree grafting and we each walked away with 2 trees with grafts of our local apple varieties. We are now waiting with baited breath to see how many of them take.
A few days later we out at soggy Barn Crescent pruning and staking. The water flow on the site has resulted in several trees leaning down the slope, so we took advantage of the muddy conditions to position several stakes ready to lash and ratchet the trees as upright as possible. Another working party is planned for later in the spring to complete this work.
Barn Crescent orchard Pruning Event 2nd March 2024
Our final pruning event of the year takes place this Saturday, 2nd March, at the Barn Crescent orchard, starting at 10am.
Location: The orchard is off Elizabeth Avenue -one entrance is near the electricity substation /car park area on Elizabeth Avenue, the other is in Barn Crescent itself just next to the new house builds. Parking is better along Elizabeth Avenue.
Warning; this site is very wet and muddy and good footwear is essential this weekend.
Pruning:
Come along and find out about the orchards and how we prune them. No experience necessary. If you have an apple tree at home and you’re not sure how to treat it, this is the day for you as we will be giving hints and tips on how to get the best from the trees.
All you need to bring is yourself, decent footware if it’s damp and ideally a pair of secateurs. Other equipment will be provided by us.
Please use the contact form with any questions.
Sayers Close orchard Pruning Event 17th February 2024
Our second pruning event of the year takes place this Saturday, 17th Feb, at the Sayer's Close orchard, starting at 10am.
Location: Sayers Close is located in the green space between Sayer's Close in Greenham and the Equine Way near Tescos. If coming by car on-road parking can be found on the Equine Way side and then walk down to the site - Sayer's Close itself has very limited on street spaces.
Pruning:
Come along and find out about the orchards and how we prune them. No experience necessary. If you have an apple tree at home and you’re not sure how to treat it, this is the day for you as we will be giving hints and tips on how to get the best from the trees.
All you need to bring is yourself, decent footware if it’s damp and ideally a pair of secateurs. Other equipment will be provided by us.
Please use the contact form with any questions.
City Rec Wassail and Pruning Event 20th January 2024
Growing Newbury Green presents the 3rd Newbury Wassail, at the Community Orchard at City Recreation ground on Sat 20th January - starting at 10am alongside the first of 3 planned public pruning events/workshops.
Traditionally a Wassail involves shouting and banging pots to drive away evil orchard spirits, hanging toast on branches and pouring cider on trees to encourage a good harvest in the coming year.
Usually performed on 12th Night, there are a few Somerset villages that celebrate later on the 17th Jan because that's Twelfth Night according to the old Julian calendar, so we're we're following this latter tradition this year!
So things to bring with you are: a pot/saucepan and something to hit it with; Cider; Toast;
With the two orchards at City Rec - our original apple one and tthe Town Council pear orchard - there's plenty of space for everyone. We will also have some pre-recorded music for the event.
Location: City Rec is on the Andover Road heading South out of Newbury. Nearest postcode is RG14 6LR. If coming by car on-road parking can be found in the surrounding streets - Wendan Road, Buckingham Road and Fifth Road, but look out for reserved residents spaces.
Pruning:
Come along and find out about the orchards and how we prune them. No experience necessary. If you have an apple tree at home and you’re not sure how to treat it, this is the day for you as we will be giving hints and tips on how to get the best from the trees.
All you need to bring is yourself, decent footware if it’s damp and ideally a pair of secateurs. Other equipment will be provided by us.
Please use the contact form with any questions.
Barn Crescent Pruning Event 25th March 2023
For the past few years we have held community pruning events at the orchards to keep them in trim and give everyone a chance to get involved and learn about fruit tree care.
Our next pruning event is on Saturday 25th March starting at 10am, at the Barn Crescent orchard - the first one we planted. We now have a mixture of maturing trees 10 years old and new plantings from 2021 and 2022, as well as the starting on an edible hedge of soft fruit and sharing the space with the inspirational Lockdown Wood.
So there's plenty to see and do on the day. All you need to bring are gardening gloves, decent footware if it's been raining and sacateurs. We will have loppers/saws and ladders for any more substantial work.
Hope to see you there.
Barn Crescent 10th Anniversary 2022On Sunday 13th March we celebrated the 10th Anniversary of the planting of our first orchard at Barn Crescent, followed by some hard work plating a new edible hedge – including raspberries, hazelnuts, blackberries and other goodies. Here are photos of the event:
Councillor Jeff Beck, who as mayor planted some of the first trees in 2012, with celebratory local cider. On the right, our Founder, Jeremy Gorbold - who originally had the idea of community planting that the group developed - along with daughter Josie and GnG coordinator Tony Hammond - all were also at the 2012 planting. This started a decade long partnership with Newbury Town Council and local residents at each site as we created new orchards. See the Our Projects page to find out more.
The full planting and pruning team to the left, on the right the new edible hedge area - not too much to see yet with the young fruit bushes!
We would like to thank Waitrose for their generous donation of £400. This will help fund our plans for 2022 and also replacing diseased trees. Unfortunately some of our trees have developed canker and although we have cut out what we can, some will need to be replaced.
If you would like to get involved with any of these projects then get in touch – details are on the contact page.
Also coordinator Tony Hammond received this year's Newbury Town Council Civic Award for Environmental Contribution, for the work done over that past 10 years. Here's a photo from the event in the Town Hall on March 16th, with Mayor Billy Drummond overseeing the award ceremony.
Ceinwen Lally and Judy Cooper, the founders of our companion project Newbury Apple Day were also nominated.
This is as much an award for the whole group for our dedication over a decade to developing and maintaining the orchards
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New micro orchard for 2022 Roebuts Close
We planted a micro orchard of 6 trees at Roebuts Close, Newbury on 12th Feb on the green space at one end of this road in southern Newbury. Residents were overwhelming in their support for this project and several came out to help with the planting. Photos of the event can be found in the Gallery section.
Wassail 2022
At last! With no Covid restrictions we finally had our first in person Wassail on Saturday 8th January at the Barn Crecent orchard. Despite the rain we had 25 revellers joining in. Here's some photos of the procession, cider pouring and our local singing group "Sing the World" performing an arrangement of an old Wassail song.
