Would you pick fruit from a Free Community Orchard?

[yesiamyesiamokaycallmeback]

There is some wasted land near my house and I asked the local MP how I would go about getting permission to plant an orchard for the community.

I will need to save up for about a year to be able to buy enough trees and bushes.

If someone planted an orchard near you would you use it? I am thinking of growing apple, pear, plum and cherry trees, raspberry and possibly currents. Maybe tomatoes as the seeds are so cheap to source and they usually do well.
Is there anything anyone would love to see in a community orchard? Possibly nut trees like Hazel or walnut but I haven't looked into this yet. would be nice.

do you think i should make signs for the trees telling people when best to harvest?

Tell me honestly would you like one in your community? would you use it?

My first thought would be it would ease the pressure on food banks over time but then I thought that maybe people wouldn't use it and it would just be a waste of time (except for me- i would use it!)

I read a few weeks ago that there is a community orchard near me. When I find it then I will use it happily.
We have put edible plants in our garden so that I could feed the dc fresh fruit. We went for easy to grow and items that were more expensive to buy, so red and black currants, gooseberries, raspberries, strawberries, rhubarb. We have an apple tree but still haven't got around to a plum tree. I'm hoping there's one in the community orchard.

Our village is part of this scheme:

www.incredibleedible.org.uk/

Works really well

We have a community orchard close by and it does get used, sadly it has also been vandalised on occasion :( the fruit trees came from the city council (environment department) along with thousands of spring bulbs - we did a sow and grow event with those and gave loads away to locals. We also have herb "boxes" you do need someone willing to manage them though.

Sounds like a good idea. I'd love to see something like that here. But how would you protect it from vandalism without restricting access?

This sounds amazing
Let us know how you did it and how you get on. I'd love to do similar but wouldn't know where to start.

We have a community orchard. It has been quite hard to keep the enthusiasm going for the maintenance of it over the years.

I would absolutely harvest fruit though.

What a fantastic idea. I would absolutely love to pick fruit from an orchard.
I would need to know I had permission to do so and if there was an honesty box be happy to leave a contribution.

I would love cherry trees as they are so expensive now, but England used to be full of cherry trees and they were so cheap when I was young.

Aside from ownership and insurance issues, I would have the soil professionally tested first to ensure that it wasnt a contaminated dump site which is not safe for safe food production.

I personally wouldn't pick from a new community orchard (vs original/long term planted) for the above reason.

This idea alone has cheered me up! What a lovely thought, OP!

Please do it. It could be one of those things that others pick up on and replicate in their area and could be of real value. I don't know why local centres like Homebase, etc couldn't donate a few trees and stuff to get you going, plus Freecycle tools,

OP, don't worry about not knowing what to say or not being a "people person". You've done very well in your post here, got lots of comments and lots of useful info. The same will happen when you try in real life.

Find out who owns the land and whether it's possible. If it's a private landowner they'll be worried about inadvertently giving over rights to their land. You might then change tack and suggest a lease at peppercorn rent and move your focus to vegetables and soft fruit - things that aren't such a disaster if you have to move off the site at short notice.

Then - approach your local council or parish council if you have one - if you don't know who to talk to, talk to a Councillor first, it's easy to google to find their names and contact details. Then look at news stories about each of them to see who's most interested in this sort of thing (you'll usually have a choice of 2 or 3 Councillors).

Find out your local community facebook post, and post on there, asking if anyone would be interested in helping.

You've already been given the Orchard Project details, and Incredible Edible for veggies.

You'll be fine. You'll meet a lot of people and get a lot of help.

There are 2 near us. One next to a big council estate with poor reputation, that is maintained by the council
One on a private estate which has dog walking paths round it. They maintain that themselves.

I have a few comments
The first orchard is lovely and I walk in it a lot. But it isn;t well used. I don't think most of the fruit is picked by people on the estate. I know quite a few daog walkers like me pop in a pick up a few windfalls, but in Nov it is obvious that a lot of fruit is rotting on the floor.
The orchard is a lovely place ot walk/sit too, but there a few who use it.
It takes quite a lot of maintainance, the grass needs cutting often in the summer. They usually mow the paths and leave it long under the trees.

The second one is really well maintained (private estate and farm, so no surprise) But at this time of year there are massives signs up about not taking the apples til they are ripe, and not being greedy with how many you take.
Despite that, they get the trees stripped every year by people who drive up with large bin bags and take the lot. We think they make cider from it. It is pretty disheartening to be honest.

In my area, unless the fruit was grown in plastic, no one would touch it.

Tesco Bags of Help offer grants to community groups with an emphasis on food poverty and helping young people. There are plenty of other grants available, though some will need you to register as a charity which becomes more complicated. Perhaps a local garden centre could sponsor you with seeds and equipment? You could get a local school or preschool involved to help with the planting and maintenance, they're often keen to teach their students about food production.

yes! We recently discovered a local one and it is amazing!! We went too late to harvest much, but managed to get some pears and apples, which i made into a lovely jam along with some locally foraged blackberries. Such a wonderful resource. Best of luck with it

I would pick fruit if it was obvious I was allowed to! And if it was obvious what it was (if you went for more unusual fruits).
I would not use it if there were nut trees there though due to severe allergies in my DC.

Could you ask local businesses to sponsor trees? (i.e. give you the money to buy them in exchange for their logo on the sign)

This resource might give you some guidance on the setup issues

www.farmgarden.org.uk/system/files/fcfcg_cgr_pack_england.pdf

I'd get in touch with your local councillor. Many councils have someone who can point people in the right direction for applying for grants etc.