Porty Town Hall Site - HELP!

As there are a couple of large trees in the centre of the garden we agreed that this part of the site should be kept grassed/planted with flowers as a social space, with growing plots either side.

We've decided to get cracking in terms of starting to clear the site. To that end we hope that as many volunteers as possible can make themselves free for a couple of hours over the next 2 weekends:

Sat 30th May, 2 - 4pm
Sun 31st May, 2 - 4pm

Sat 6th June, 2 - 4pm
Sun 7th June, 2 - 4pm

You will need gloves and please bring loppers/secateurs if you have them. Entrance to the site is via the Sir Harry Lauder memorial garden at Portobello Town Hall.

World Nakd Gardening Day

No, we are not making it up...there really is a 'World Naked Gardening Day'. However, Guerrilla Gardening is quite exciting (and chilly) enough without taking off layers of clothing so we decided to celebrated World Nakd Gardening Day/Week/Month, with the help of our friends at Natural Balance Foods.



While we were mixing clay, wildflower seeds, sunflowers and compost to make seedbombs, little gnomes were working through the night smooshing raw fruit, nuts and oats into these uber-healthy yum-bombs.


They were very well received by the troops, junior guerrillas and members of the public alike with cries of "Ooh, give me more, More, MORE" and "Das war köstlich!" and "How often do you guys meet? I'd really like to join you".





The Trek Bars were large enough for two hungry guerrillas to share (a perfect breakfast for early morning starts), while the Banana Bread was a handy size to shove in back pockets as a quick snack on the run.

The raisins were a huge hit with the young gardeners with the cherry infused variety being the most popular.

And, the entire Nakd range is suitable for vegans.

The Nakd bars were all branded with a little bee which was quite appropriate as we were meeting to put together packets of 'Burning Bee' - our bee attracting seed mix.


Those of us on seed packet duty discovered that the Wildly Different bars went great with a glass of wine (those of us on digging duty discovered that if you have a glass of wine you have trouble balancing on your fork).




















Thank you Nakd for the best fun a gardener can have with their clothes on! To get hold of your own Prezzie box, packed full of things that make you say 'Yum!', visit the Nakd shop.

International Guerrilla Sunflower Day - Prestonpans Posse

As all good guerrillas know, May 1st is International Guerrilla Sunflower Day. You can read about other people's activities on this Guerrilla Gardening forum thread. We couldn't join the rest of the troop in Edinburgh so carried out a series of missions in our home town of Prestonpans.
This morning, I took my two youngest children to a tiny patch of land off Wilson Avenue to plant sunflower seeds. It is my favourite type of guerrilla gardening site - lots of pedestrian traffic, largely unnoticed... and with the potential to be stunning. Ironically, it backs on to the formal and very well maintained Tower Gardens, notable for its beautiful laburnham archway.
We removed some weeds and broken glass then planted gladioli and the front and sunflower seeds all along the back wall. For a bit of instant colour we transplanted some grape hyacinth taken from our back garden.

After a good water (we took a milk bottle and take an extra, punctured lid to act as sprinkler) we paid a visit to our second site in the Conservation Village - the 'Caged Sunflowers' on Preston Road, (they were planted in a tree cage). We removed some of the choking weeds and were pleased to see the seedlings are coming on fine. A police patrol car gave no more than a passing glance at our 'Little Princess' and 'Barbie' gardening trugs.
Back home we grabbed the seedbombs we had made a couple of days ago (wildflower seeds, sunflower seeds, compost and fuller's earth) and flung them over the parking lot in Preston Court.

You can see all the Prestonpans sunflower sites plotted on this map (switch to 'Bird's Eye View' for a glimpse of the beautiful gardens).