It may have been a long while since our last post, but that doesn’t mean we’ve been inactive.

In fact there is always plenty of activity down at the Old North Stables, and especially so during this period of glorious early summer weather.

As this photograph shows, the site has continued to expand and develop organically from where we were when we first started.

Everything we have planted this year is starting to come up. Our tomatoes are thriving in the new big greenhouse, and we are growing melons and vines in our other greenhouses. If we can replicate last year’s bumper melon crop we’ll be very happy.

We also have plenty of outdoor crops on the way, including the beautifully quaint “walking onion”, a plant which grows a perfect set of baby onions at the top of its stem. These eventually fall to the ground, where the individual baby onions take root in the soil and so continue this plant’s extraordinary life cycle.

Tony and his small band of volunteers aren’t the only ones keeping busy down at the Old North Stables. Our honey bee hives are thriving, and their numbers have been swelled recently by the arrival of a new swarm which decided it liked the look of the place and took over one of our empty hives.

Our honey bees, together with local wild bees, have been busy foraging amongst the borage, a great favourite, as well as other flowering plants on and around the site.

We’re intending to post on a more regular basis in future, but in the meantime why not drop in to the Old North Stables and see for yourself what we’re doing here? You will always be warmly welcomed and shown around the site.

We would also be delighted to welcome any new volunteers who are interested in helping out, either on a regular or an occasional basis.

Even if you can only spare an hour or so, there are always jobs that need doing, and we don’t mind whether you have skills to share or would simply like to muck in and learn new skills: no one is ever turned away!