EATS in 2016

EATS Rosyth

2016 was the year EATS really took off in Rosyth. Rosyth Community Council were awarded £110,000 from the Climate Challenge Fund in March 2016. They were able to employ a food worker and 2 gardeners for they year. Food growing has really increased in the town and a hub has been opened at the former post office.

opening of the new hub, Rosyth

 

Have a look a their website

Have a look also at the video that was made

 

Kirkcaldy

EATS kept going in Kirkcaldy with the help of the Scottish Association for Mental Health. Since 2013 they have been supplying for free plants for Bennochy Rd, Town House and Peebles St EATS.

Growing Kirkcaldy continued to look after the Forth House House EATS

Flowers and vegetables didn’t seem to grow as well in Kirkcaldy. This could be down to soil fertility. Town House EATS has been used for 5 years without any compost being added.

CLEAR Buckhaven continued to plant the bed at College Street Buckhaven.

The edible campus at St Andrews started using the EATS logo in their signs.

Dunfermline Eco Group planted their first EATS outside the library at Abbeyview. Douglas Chapman supplied some of the herbs

free food in Markinch

Markinch Environment Action Group continued their EATS in the village. The group created really sturdy planters outside the Memorial Hall which were filled with potatoes and nasturtiums and planted fruit in the car park of the railway station. MEAG signs are good, which are low cost and get the free food message across.

planter at Memorial Hall, Markinch

really good simple and low cost sign

Growing Kirkcaldy adopt Forth House EATS

Growing Kirkcaldy this adopted the bed. They provided plants from some of their gardens, planted out the bed and are maintaining the bed. The planting up of the bed featured in a Fife Free Press Article. Growing Kirkcaldy having been working hard through the year as Keep Scotland Beautiful invited the group to enter Kirkcaldy in Britain in Bloom ( Small City category ) The town was judged on the 7th August. Thankfully it was a warm and sunny. The EATS were shown to the judges.

Forth House EATS

Fife Free Press article

Peebles St EATS evolving

2014 was the first year of the Peebles St EATS, which was created late in the season last year.

Learning from 2014, this year the EATS was divided into 4 beds, a root vegetable bed, cabbage family bed, onions and other vegetables, peas and beans and a fruit bed. The fruit bed even has a grapevine in the middle.

Community Payback are helping Invertiel Tenants and Residents Association maintain. The bed was planted out with SAMH volunteers, residents and pupils from Kirkcaldy West Primary School.

10th June – SAMH volunteers preparing EATS

pupils from Kirkcaldy West Primary School helping to plant cabbages and kale

tattie spacing- David Ross of SAMH , laying out where the potatoes are to be planted in the root vegetable bed

Peebles St – August 2015

sunflowers

cabbage family bed

sweet corn in the other vegetables bed. Mixed weather this summer, be interesting to see if any cobs are eatable

the peas and beans bed

Grapevine growing in the centre bed. Be interesting to see if any grapes form.

Jayne Baxter MSP visits

We were pleased to show Jayne Baxter MSP around the Kirkcaldy EATS on the 27th July 2015. It was a cold wet morning but the interest shown by Jayne Baxter helped to warm up the morning. David Ross of Scottish Association talked about all the different vegetables that are grown. Members of Growing Kirkcaldy talked about their adopted EATS at Forth House. On the last stop of the tour we showed Jayne, the Peebles Street EATS. Archie Mellville of Fife Community Payback Service talked about how their clients help maintain the bed. Marlene Robertson of Invertiel Tenants and Residents talked about the associations involvement. Along the way we were able to pick vegetables from the EATS beds for Jayne.

EATS in 2015

Posts on wordpress have been a bit neglected this year, this is not the case with Twitter as we have been posting plenty of photos.

The EATS project continues to evolve and expand.

Rosyth Community Council have created new EATS in the town and have a really good facebook page https://www.facebook.com/EATS.Rosyth.

Floral Action Burntisland after a talk about EATS in May at Beautiful Fife seminar created an EATS at the corner of the High Street.

The Peebles Street EATS in Kirkcaldy is the still the largest EATS with the widest range of fruit and vegetables, and in some ways now is the show piece EATS. Growing Kirkcaldy planted up and maintain the Forth House EATS and Scottish Association for Mental Health still maintain the Town House EATS.

Markinch Environmental Action Group are still maintaining their EATS in the village.

EATS inspired eatable public spaces are still being maintained in Newburgh, Buckhaven and in Dundee

join us at our EATS Supper

We are having an alternative to a Burns Supper, an EATS supper! 21st January 2015 6:30-8:30pm. St Margaret’s Church Hall, Woodside, Glenrothes, Fife In the days of Burns Supper why not join us for our supper. We will talk about the benefits, share some food, and talk about our plans for 2015.

If you would like to attend please email kevin.okane@fife.gov.uk. We need to know numbers for catering.
click on the link for more information.

Edible and Tasty Spaces Supper 21st January 2015

 

A look back at EATS in 2014

As we are nearing the end of 2014, it is good to reflect on EATS during the last year.

2014 was the year that EATS started to set roots in other towns in Fife. 2013 saw EATS in Broxburn in West Lothian but this did not continue in 2014.

Kirkcaldy

Kirkcaldy was where EATS started and it is still going strong there. There is a good collaboration of organisations working in the town, which include Fife Council, Scottish Association for Mental Health, Growing Kirkcaldy, Invertiel Tenants & Residents Association and Greener Kirkcaldy.

Town House bed

https://fifeeats.wordpress.com/2014/11/17/town-house-eats-kirkcaldy/

EATS was back at the bed outside Town House in 2014. This was the first EATS and it was a blaze of colour in 2014. The EATS here impressed Beautiful Scotland judges. Growing Kirkcaldy’s entry went on to win gold for the town in the Beautiful Scotland awards.

Town House EATS was well harvested. One person had harvested a red cabbage and went back and filled the spot with a cabbage from his garden.

Growing Kirkcaldy wheelbarrows

https://fifeeats.wordpress.com/2014/11/17/growing-kirkcaldy-wheelbarrows/

Discussion at a steering group meeting developed into a Growing Kirkcaldy project, EATS wheelbarrows. Normal metal wheelbarrows and miniature wooden wheelbarrows where filled with vegetables and flowers and given to willing shop / hotel and offices. There were approximately 15 throughout the town centre. There was good positive feedback from the retailers.

Peebles St

https://fifeeats.wordpress.com/2014/11/17/peebles-st-eats-kirkcaldy/

An EATS was created for Invertiel Tenants and Residents Association at Peebles St. The EATS was dug quite late in early July and planted up then. This EATS wasn’t planned to the same extent as Town House. It was filled with a mix of flowers and vegetables. A couple of rows of potatoes were included. The Residents Association distributed vegetables when they were ready and some people helped themselves. This bed wasn’t watered so the sweet corn didn’t survive the dry period in July.

EATS locations can be seen on the location page in the website. https://fifeeats.wordpress.com/eats-locations/

SAMH maintained beds – Town house, Forth House, Bennochy Rd, Templehall

Greener Kirkcaldy – Ravenscraig Park

Markinch

Markinch Environment Action Group adopted EATS and created planters at the railway station and outside the Memorial Hall

https://fifeeats.wordpress.com/2014/11/17/markinch-eats/

CLEAR Buckhaven

CLEAR Buckhaven created an EATS at College St

https://fifeeats.wordpress.com/2014/11/17/college-st-eats-clear-buckhaven/

Auchtermuchty

Muchty in Bloom created two EATS. The EATS were in the form of planters on the Dunshalt Rd.

https://www.facebook.com/muchtyinbloom

Newburgh  – Gardens by the Tay

Although not called an EATS, Gardens by the Tay has adopted EATS principles and in the second year the bed is equally impressive. David Ross was interviewed on Radio Scotland.

 

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p0258216

Promotion

One of the reasons that EATS has grown and spread is that we try and promote EATS. We organised a seminar in May and 40 opeople attended from across Scotland.

https://fifeeats.wordpress.com/2014/11/17/eats-seminar-may-2014/

Fife Council Green Infrastructure SG

Twitter followers rose to 360 followers

Lessons from 2014

EATS is very much about learning how to grow food to share in public spaces. A number of lessons can be learnt from 2014

Signage – signage is important but it costs money.

Watering  – the dry weather in July caused stress to plants, it is hard to water EATS beds. CLEAR Buckhaven found no problem with water stress.

Harvesting – If the EATS beds is in a good location then it will be harvested. Peebles St was interesting, in that it was an EATS in public greenspace in a residential area. The Residents group distributed the vegetables but also probably due to word of mouth vegetables were harvested.

College St EATS, CLEAR Buckhaven

We were very pleased when CLEAR Buckhaven decided to create an EATS in the open space at College St. CLEAR Buckhaven have been doing great work in the town in the last five years. http://www.clearfife.org.uk/Index.asp?MainID=7291

In the last five years they have planted 1,500 fruit trees around the town. Below is the orchard planted behind the library.

College Street open space was the perfect place to create an EATS, in an open space just opposite the shops and beside the local office, not far from the CLEAR Buckhaven office. A range of fruit, flowers and vegetables were planted. One person who has had an allotment plot has given this up and she is now just happy harvesting vegetables from this bed.

Labels created by children were really good.

 

one of the labels created by local children for sweet corn

Markinch EATS

Theres a lot ‘growing’ on in Markinch, a village east of Glenrothes, Fife. One of the best allotments is situated in the walled garden at Balbirnie Park. Following on from this Markinch Environment Action group decided to support EATS by creating EATS.

They have created planters filled with vegetables outside the Memorial Hall and done marvellous work around the train station. Fruit trees and bushes and car park and herb planters on the platforms.

http://www.markinchenvironment.org.uk/Index.asp?MainID=17982