Community Orchard

Inspiration and calling

Feeling into what this land wants to grow...

was the clear answer.

Lets together make it happen! :) And share the joy of creating, caring for, and sharing the harvest with wildlife and like-minded people.

The Community orchard is intended to weave together relationships between people, food and the environment and to make these accessible to anyone.

This really is about bringing people and the land together; creating supportive networks, while working together on the land and sharing its gifts.

Design Principles

Under the umbrella and values of the Mandala Garden project, one acre of land is available realise the visions above.

Principles of cultivation will be guided by biodynamic/organic certification and permaculture principles of earth care, people care and fair share.

The design process of this orchard will be a combination of woodland fruit gardens, and organic, low maintenance agro-forestry.

Woodland fruit design is inspired by natural ecosystems with high diversity and resilience, at the same time producing abundant fruit. This is achieved by a planting a diverse range of fruits, berries and other plants.

Let's team up and get growing :)

The beauty and challenge of a community orchard is the fact that it is a long term project. It can grow and be added to, at its own pace. This will be ensured and supported by being an integral part of the Mandala Garden Project.

With time, trees shrubs grow and facilities will evolve. After the initial set up process, these trees and shrubs will mature and bear fruit.

Soft fruit harvest starts in 2023. This only needs time plus regular maintenance, such as cutting grass, pruning and maintaining fences and stakes.

The community orchard team will co-create the orchard design, coordinating volunteers, networking and grant applications.

Become part of growing this dream!

Please ask if you’d like to know more

Key highlights of progress this year include :

The Orchard headquarters landed :)

At the end of 2021, a large portacabin arrived at Mandala Garden.

After preparing the ground, building four pillars and moving countless wheelbarrows of stones, the cabin arrived on a huge truck. The truck subsequently got stuck as its tyres sank into the soft earth!

With a great team effort, after many hours we celebrated watching the cabin gradually descend and land on its pillars.

The cabin will serve the community orchard as a space for group gatherings, meetings, refreshments, and as a fine office for years to come.

See more photos here

Planting out

The soft fruit cuttings made last year were planted on and ready this Spring to put their roots into the earth at Mandala Garden.

In March, a devoted core team of five prepared beds, at the eastern edge of the Orchard, in soil that has laid pasture for many years. We then placed these beauties in their beds :

• 24 gooseberries,
• 26 redcurrants,
• 10 loganberries,
• 30 blackcurrants,
• 6 jostaberries,
• 3 cultivated blackberries,
• Seabuckthorn, and
• 60+ cherry plums

All are growing well and some have fruited already. Yay! :)

We’re preparing new cuttings to join the family in 2023, and have plans to grow more super foods like aronia berries in years to come.

See more photos here

Apple tree nursery and Deer fence fundraiser

The fruit trees and bushes in the nursery are growing well (see the planting layout), partly thanks to the temporary high fence erected last year.

The 100+ apple saplings, grafted at Mandala Garden, remain in the nursery as they have yet to find their place.

The challenge is this: Before they can be planted out a robust deer fence is needed all around the garden.

Please help manifest this fence - a vital investment - to protect the garden from over-grazing.

Click the Donate Now button at the top of this page, or Contact Us if you would like to donate in other ways.

Thank you!

Key highlights of progress in 2021 :

Creating hedges

In March 2021 about 300 metres of native wildlife hedge was planted around the perimeter fences, to the north and west, with the help of a grant from the Woodland Trust.

The hedge consists of hawthorn, hazel, crab apple, blackthorn, holly, wild roses, and trees like rowan, birch, larch and lime. They’re all growing well.

Cherry plums

We love cherry plums, so we planted 50 saplings along the eastern perimeter of the orchard. In the same hedge, we planted a special fruiting variety of amazing sea buckthorn called ‘Leikora’. However, no fruits will come until the male bushes mature in 2025.

Huge thanks to all the volunteers who helped plant, weed and mulch all these hedges. You’re amazing!

Propagation

2020’s soft fruit cuttings were planted on to be ready by Spring 2022 to put their roots into the earth at Mandala Garden:

• Gooseberries,
• Redcurrants,
• Loganberries,
• Blackcurrants,
• Jostaberries,
• Cultivated blackberries, and
• Cherry plums

We also prepared new cuttings to join the family in 2023, and plan to grow more super foods like aronia berries in years to come.

Apple tree nursery

In the Spring we grafted 100 apple rootstocks^{^} with various scions (a cutting of a young tree shoot). This was quite an adventure!

Fortunately, the absolute expert from the Nairn community orchard, Des, offered lots of advice and grafted many of them. Many thanks, Des!

We saw about a 70% success rate (which is very good), and the ones that didn’t “take” can be reused as rootstock in coming years.

Lots of wonderful and interesting scions were gathered from around the area – from the Nairn community orchard, from Liselotte’s orchard, from the trees at Woodhead, etc.

Deep gratitude to all who contributed to the community orchard at Mandala Garden!

^{^} The rootstock of a fruit tree determines the size and vigor of growth, whereas the scion determines the apple variety – it’s a miracle to see this symbiosis happening.

All these young apples trees were growing beautifully in a nursery area in the quiet NE corner of the Garden. Until, that is, August 2021 when the deer discovered these tasty bites.

So, we built a strong, temporary deer fence around the nursery to protect it during the winter. It was an amazing team effort as we learnt along the way.

We designed the fence so that all the materials can be easily reused when the nursery no longer needs it.