Community Fund – Greener Leith – September Update

Greener Leith receives more funding for the Children’s Orchard

Since the Children’s Orchard was planted up in 2010 Greener Leith has had the wish to make more of it;  to create a fully functioning educational resource, benefiting local school children as well as the wider local community.  With the excellent news of more funding on the way from Awards for All we have come a step closer to achieving this.  First of all and most importantly , the trees will be labelled so people will be able to see what is actually growing in the orchard as until now we felt that it was better for them to grow in relative anonymity while they were small and easily vandalised.  Secondly, we have funding for Forest School lessons.

This will be great fun for local school children who will have an opportunity to get out of their class rooms, explore nature and learn all sorts of useful things out of doors.  We’re even getting picnic benches  made so that they can sit down in comfort!  We will also have a proper notice board to let people know that the orchard is not a place to let your dog run wild but a food production area that will get better and better as the years pass.

And you don’t have to actually be in the orchard to find out more about it.  We will make labels with QR codes so that anyone with a smartphone can access the Greener Leith website for useful and interesting information about the trees; their origin, cultivation, culinary uses of the fruit.  The school children will also produce drawings and stories about the orchard, for everyone to share.