The Potting Shed
The TTV’s Potting Shed is located next to the Tools n Things Library and has been established to support the activities of the My Healthy Soils project and the nearby Community Food Forest. It is essentially a wire cage about 36 square metres in area covered with shadecloth.
Objectives include to provide a place:
- Where we can experiment and trial a locally regenerative approach to converting sand to soil
- Trial the use of biochar and other organics (e.g. compost, worm juice/castings) for growing seedlings and other plants
- Provide a place where community members can grow seedlings and swap seeds and knowledge
- Provide a place for community outreach events including those related to biochar making, worm farming and compost making
On the first busy bee on 9th September 2024 the following activities were undertaken:
- The cage was cleaned out and re-organised.
- Existing shade cloth was fixed properly to the cage.
- Some temporary work benches using old pallets were put into place.
- Existing shelves were filled with seedlings and other materials.
Britannia community nursery – seedlings
Britannia community nursery September 2024
Helen filling the water tank September 2024
On the second busy bee on 14th September the following activities were undertaken:
- A new workbench was constructed from other existing white ant free pallets.
- Seeds were sown in the planting trays.
- Existing seedlings were watered.
- Some seedlings were transplanted.
Sandy waters the seedlings
Steve making a work bench
Sandy repotting some seedlings
Events
Our inaugural event at the Potting Shed was a Swap and Grow morning on 5th October where the focus was on biochar. Over 20 people participated in various activities with highlights including:
- Chris Cutress’ tour of our year old community food forest and an overview of how we used biochar and compost in the plantings to improve water holding capacity and nutrient availability
- Chris Watts’ talk on how to use biochar in the garden and the discussion that followed
- Evie Kininmonth running mini workshops with a couple of littlies around and sowing seeds and transplanting seedlings using a mix of sand, biochar and compost
- Everyone walking away with something including seedlings grown with biochar and Fogo compost in the Potting Shed and free bag(s) of biochar donated for trial purposes by Fasera Biochar
A number of people were there to swap seeds and food.
Chris Watts talks about biochar with Burnie the biochar maker in the background
Chris Cutress talks about the food forest and the role of biochar and compost in improving the water holding capacity of the soil
Contact:
M: 0401 521 895