Landmark Autumn Celebration Sat 5th Nov

Deal With It has its Autumn Celebration in the Landmark Garden on Saturday 5th Nov to raise money for our community gardens for the next season. 

We will deploy the apple press, have food to sample, some hot pots , plants and hopefully a few stalls.

The Landmark Ukulele Club is going to play for us (the club meets at the Landmark every Friday from 10am)

Landmark Garden, High St Deal - 10:30am to 1pm

Community Garden's recognised by Deal Town Council

Deal Town Council recognised Deal With It's volunteers contribution to the town success in this year's SE in Bloom at a gathering at the town hall on Monday.

The informal gathering with the mayor awarded certificates of appreciation to the many organisations, individuals, businesses and community gardens who had supported the Town's bid in this year's SE in Bloom.

Deal With It was recognised for the projects at Deal Station Garden and the Landmark Community Garden on Deal High St.

Our colleagues at Sandown Castle Community Garden were also awarded for their efforts at transforming the Sandown Castle site.

The award is assessed on environmental and community involvement as well as Horticultural Achievement

Deal Big Dig - Deal Station Meadow Making 21st March

We been meadow making again on the Waste land near Deal Rail Station this morning on the first part of 'Deal's Big Dig'.

In 2014 we did an area of about 80sq m as Poppy Meadow to mark the start of WW1.

This year we have extended the area to about 95sqm and are planting a perennial Hay Meadow. This will take a couple of years to establish but will reduce the amount of annual digging that needs to be done. We will plant out some annual meadow seeds for poppies and cornflowers to brighten things up for the first year.

This will be a great resource for wildlife and pollinators as well as looking great.

Big, Big thanks to our 15 volunteers who helped this morning - the digging was hard and felt more like archaeology at times with all the rubble (the site was the old ticket office demolished in ealy 1970s).

We also managed to relocate one of the Ramsgate Platform Planters to further up the platform.

We will be out again on Sunday from 10am to about 12ish - Very welcome to join us.

We will be sowing the meadows probably on Sunday 29th March about 2pm - we need about 10 people to help and should only take about 30 minutes

We will be also looking at the other meadow areas nr BT Exchange and Car park later on.

If you want to get involved email sarah station@dealwithit.org.uk

Sparkle at the Deal Station Garden

Our Gardeners were out today doing a end of year tidy and adding some sparkle to our planters at the Station.

Thanks to Sarah, Phillip and Pat

Happy Xmas to all from Deal Station Garden group

Deal Station Garden group: 'Poems on the Platforms'

Adrian O and Alan Gleave from Deal Station Garden group have curated a collection of 20 WW1 poems on the platforms of the Deal Station.

This is wide collection of the famous and non-so famous, from a wide array of counties, by men, women and personal contemporary ones written locally.

This is compliment our work in creating poppy meadows on the waste ground near the ramsgate platform, in the station car park and in front of the West St Telephone Exchange

We love the idea of overlapping communities using the same 'space'.

It adds another dimension to our community garden and meadow areas.

We will look at doing this again with other themes later in the year.

See the photos of the poems here

Seedy Saturday 5th July

Another successful Seedy Saturday today in the Landmark Community Garden.

 Iam totally amazed how word-of-mouth and little bit of the internet gets the word out.

Lots of people turning up with swaps or donations of plants for the event. Thank you all for supporting the event.

A big thank you to the Sunshine Ukes - Deal's own Ukulele Band - who entertained us

We took donations of £37 for the gardens at the landmark and station

Planting up at the Deal Station Garden ....

The Team were out again today (Sat) at the Deal Station Garden - all nine planters have now had their first planting with a mix of early cropping salad and perennial edibles with some companion flowers.

Our store area has been taken over by tons of strawberrys to go out later in the month.

The crabble apple and poppy areas all look progressing well .... we have a volunteer from one of the houses nr the car park to water the tree. Sarah has done a great job in organising the watering schedule...

for more info contact sarah at station@dealwithit.org.uk

Suggested planting list for next week...

Deal Station Gardening Group

Spring/Summer Planting Plan 2014

 

We wanted to maximise visual impact as well as illustrate some basic veg planting techniques (drought, companion planting).  Plants have been chosen for colour, hardiness and mixed heights.

 

A common theme in all the planters will be the planting of wild flowers to grow up amongst the veg.  Red poppies, white oxeye daisies and corncockles in remembrance of the start of the Great War. 

 

 

Ramsgate Platform

X2 new long thing planters

Fennel

Red Valerian

Trailing rosemary

Lavender

Purple Sage

Teasels

- will need a water retentive mulch, bark chips or broken sea shells maybe

 

London Platform

Planters 1 & 2 (country end)

Broad Beans  - existing and new sowings

French bean – seedlings, started in greenhouses

Rainbow chard  - planted in blocks

Beetroot – planted in blocks

 

 

Planter 3  (by the gate)

Rhubarb – already in situ

Strawberries – in situ

Cranberries – in situ

Gooseberry -  to purchase, large and spiky

 

Planters 4 & 5

Salad – early spring

Sweetcorn in grid formation                      }

Squash between sweetcorn                     } 3 sisters

Beans (maybe) up the sweetcorn                        }

Trailing nasturtiums

Front of the Station  - Sue and Adrian to source and report back 

Globe artichoke

Chives

Coriander

dill

Parsley

Wild flowers as above

Busy day at the Deal Community Garden's

Again we got a great response for our volunteers today: with 16 people out this morning

At Deal Station Garden we moved nearly 2 tons of topsoil to the two new planters on the Ramsgate Platform.

We setup two additional planters outside the main Station entrance 

and a team completed our third Pop-up Poppy Meadow dig at the Deal Telephone Exchange and sowed the poppy seed. If any one has any poppy or wildflower seed we could do with some at the two end areas...

Meanwhile back at the Landmark Garden Imogen and crew are starting plant up veg & salad crops. We also got a nice donation of runner beans for the front bed.

Next Saturday 12th - the Deal Station team are planting up the planters from about 9:30am - the suggested planting list is below - please contact Adrian O if you have any other suggestions or bring plants on Saturday...

We need help to remove the waste bags from the Telephone Exchange - so if you passing en route to the recycling centre please help yourself ...

Big thank you to everyone who turned out on this bright and sunny day in Deal ....

Deal's BigDig day 2 - Meadow Making @ Deal Station

The weather was a lot kinder to us this weekend, rather than the hail & rain our volunteers endured last week.

Dave had done sterling work during the week to do a second dig and with all the bricks and rocks he dug out even manage to build a rockery at the end of the site.

We had donation of tons of Daffodil's bulbs from the Adelaide Cafe at Hacklinge ... have to see if they are viable next year but all planted.

We had two tons of toil soil delivered to the waste land on the Ramsgate side of the station to give a good base to the 115sq m we cleared the week before.

After getting that spread and the Poppy and Golden Coreopsis seeds sowed we formed a Green-Line dance to tread the the seeds in.

We had enough energy to work on two more mini-meadows: One on triangle of waste land in the Car Park - where we have

also planted a crab apple tree








and the third mini-meadow on the waste land in front of the telephone exchange opposite the Coop.

Next weekend 5th April we need volunteers to help soiling up the new planters on the Ramsgate Platform and completing the Phone Exchange area.

A big thank you to our 14 volunteers today and to Rose & Adrian for their version of the 'World Turned upside down' .... Thank you Diggers all!

New Planters for Deal Station Garden

We took delivery last friday of the two new planters for the Ramsgate platform at Deal Station Garden.

These were made locally at Ripplevale School who also donated them to the project. We thank the pupils and staff for their generous donation.

The team will be getting soil and compost in on Saturday 5th April and planting starts on 12th April. New volunteers are always welcome. please conatc Sarah & Alan at Station@dealwithit.org.uk or see our FB groups

Thank you to Sally for for the pics

Another busy community gardening day in Deal ,,,

Another great weekend in Deal and for our Community Gardening projects:

The Landmark Community Garden is looking better with each week. We are starting to sow seed and planning the planting. Lots of great feedback on Imogen's woven raised beds at the front. All the green manure (we use mustard) is now all dug in. If you want get involved email imogen at landmark@dealwithit.org.uk or ring Steve 01304 372673

We just heard that the Subsidence issue on the waste land at Deal Rail Station is now resolved so are looking at dates for a 'Big Dig' to transform that land into one of our mini-meadows.

All looks good for the new planters on the platform coming on Friday 21st March. We are soiling up on the 5th April and planting on the 12th April. We will need lots of help on all those days. Please contact Sarah & Alan at Station@dealwithit.org.uk or 01304 389553

 Also work has started on waste land in front of the telephone exchange by our guerrilla gardeners.

Again we want to transform this eyesore into a bee friendly wild-flower area.

Nice weather so full speed at the community gardens in Deal ..

With today's lovely weather the town seemed to come alive again and so too with our local food projects at the Deal Station Garden and Landmark Community Garden

Our team around the Deal Station Garden are preparing to expand the planters on the platforms in April.

Today they were doing a bit of meadow making in the car park - an unloved bit of land in the station car park was cleared in preparation for a planting in a couple of weeks a poppy field meadow to make it more bee friendly, brighten up an eye-sore and remember WW1.

We hope to do this elsewhere in the town - so if you know of spots please let us know at info@dealwithit.org.uk

Meanwhile at the Landmark Community Garden Imogen and Steve (assisted by our youngest volunteer Wilf) made good in-roads in preparing the front beds for planting. Imogen's home made woven raised bed is looking really good.

The Deal Station Gardeners can be contacted at station@dealwithit.org.uk and the Landmark at landmark@dealwithit.org.uk

Deal's Seedy Saturday 1st March - Landmark Community Garden

We have our first Seedy Saturday seed and plant swap at the Landmark Community Garden on Sat 1st March 11am-3pm (ish)

Please bring your seeds, half opened packets, cuttings ready to swap ... spring is on its way (honest)

Deal Station Garden - Planning meeting 9th Jan

We are looking to expand the Deal Station Garden this year plus we would like get at least one Community Garden project off the ground elsewhere in the town.

There will be a planning meeting on Sunday 9th January at 3pm at Sarah & Alan's - 117 London Road, Deal to discuss our plans for 2014.

If you cannot make the meeting  but want to be involved at either of  Community Garden projects at the Station or the Landmark please email info@dealwithit.org.uk or ring 01304 372673

Benefit evening raises £150 for Deal Station Garden

Good benefit evening for the Deal Station Garden last night at St Andrews raised £150 for the garden expansion.

Some great music and the raffle was a hoot - a recyled prize/ second use one. Some interesting items on that table ... its good how the right items seem to end up with right people.

A big thank you to our performers Sunshine Ukes, Lizzie and Sue, Mac & Clive, Deal Hoodeners and No Worries. Special thanks go to Adrian for the MCing and money raising and Sue for running the cake aspects of the evening.

Thanks also to everyone who donated raffle and cakes...

Deal Station Garden Benefit 23rd Nov - Change of Venue

From Adrian O

HI EVERYONE........OUR MUSICAL EVENING IN AID OF DEAL STATION PLANTERS.....WILL STILL GO AHEAD ON SAT 23rd NOV at 7.30

BUT AT A NEW VENUE.....IT SEEMS THE RMA had done a treble booking in different diaries....leading to big probs....so

WE WILL BE AT St ANDREWS CHURCH HALL , WEST STREET DEAL CT14 6DZ....( straight along WEST STREET....past the Alma Pub....next block....we will have signs out for those that dont know it.......THE GOOD NEWS ...IS IT HAS A KITCHEN WE CAN USE....SO WE WILL ALSO BE DOING REFRESHMENTS....COFFEE , TEA....AND SCRUMMY CAKES....ALL CAKES WELCOME.....Talk to SUE

WE HAVE A WONDERFUL LINE UP FOR THE EVENING....MUSIC FROM THE SUNSHINE UKES, THE DEAL HOODENERS, SUE AND LIZZI, CLIVE AND MAC, YOURS TRULY....AND TO TOP IT ALL OFF ....THE SUPERB NO WORRIES.....IT IS GOING TO BE A GREAT EVENING SO TELL ALL YOUR FRIENDS...AND IT IS IN A REALLY GOOD CAUSE.

THE EVENING WILL ALSO FEATURE A PRELOVED RAFFLE.....ANY ITEM THAT CAN BE GIVEN A NEW HOME....WE ALL HAVE STUFF THAT IS HANGING ABOUT....WORTH SOMETHING THAT SOMEONE ELSE COULD GIVE A HOME TO.......DO BRING SOMETHING ALONG IF YOU HAVE AN ITEM OR TWO.

PLEASE MAKE SURE ALL KNOW ABOUT THE CHANGE OF VENUE.....AND LOOK FORWARD TO SEEING YOU THERE....BEST WISHES, ADRIAN O

DWI Benefit 4 Deal Station Garden 23rd Nov

We have a Evening Musical benefit for the Deal Station Garden with an vast array local talent appearing at the RMA Walmer on Saturday 23rd November at 7:30pm -entry £2.

The purpose of the evening is to raise money for our food growing project at Deal Station. This has had a successful first season - we managed to raise the money through donations for five planters. We now want to expand it for 2014.

The evening is being by organised local performer and song writer (and Gardenista) Adrian O:

"come and enjoy a great social evening. The only business on the agenda.....is.....
a superb evening of invited musical guests......with a monster raffle......a preloved raffle......

Please donate something that you don't use and would be of use to someone else. Could be anything from a book...plant....cd to a household or garden tool......or even something more unusual....have a look through and see what you could donate.
hopefully see you all on saturday evening 23rd of november"

Adrian is currently running the Comedy Club Session at the Deal Hoy on Thursdays

Landmark Pot & Plant Sale today

Thank you for everyone who supported our Pot & Plant sale today at the Landmark Community Garden.

Special thanks to all those who donated pots and plants, volunteers for helping and to Driftwood (Rose & Sue) for the added music.

We raised £40 to be split between the projects at Deal Station Garden and Landmark

Beans, Beans from Deal Station Garden

 The Deal Station Garden is proving to be very productive - our gardeners have harvested several pounds of broad beans.

The groups plans to expand the garden later in the year once it discussed its plans with SE Railway.


If you would like to get involved, donate plants or dosh please contact sarah or alan on 01304 389

553 or email food@dealwithit.org