Annual Report 2024-2025
Charity Number 1201986 Haxby, York.
Year Two Taking Shape 2024-2025
If there is one thing we have learnt from nature, it’s that things will happen at their own pace and in their own time. Often, it’s not as fast as we would like it, but we have learnt patience. We have a small team, so ‘instant garden’ isn’t going to be happening any time soon, but nature has shown us what happens when we watch and wait. Along with the many ‘weeds’ is the most amazing wildlife. We were delighted when 18 ducklings appeared in the pond in spring. We also had greenfinches enjoying the teazels and the elephant hawk moth hiding in the long grass. We remember that we are there for our ‘nonhuman’ community as well as our human community.
It’s been a joy to welcome them too; whether it’s the NHS staff having a well-earned break or a meeting in the fresh air, or schools planting bulbs or a local nursery bringing their toddlers, our garden is a hidden gem.
We share our annual report with you as an opportunity to reflect, with gratitude, on all that has happened and start to warm up our wellies for the next growing year!
1.The Tannery - A bit of history 2.& 3. Community Involvement 4.Volunteers
5.Events
6.Financials and Policies 7.Plans for next year
The Tannery A bit of history
The Garden and the adjacent cottages, as well as the Doctor’s Surgery itself were on the site of and old Tannery. While fascinating from a local history point of view, it did present some potential problems for growing food directly in the ground (a small matter of things like arsenic being used in the tanning process!). Although it’s around 100 years since it was used as a tannery, we were reluctant to grow any food in the ground until we had the soil tested. The City of York Council kindly gave us a grant to have that done and we are in the clear, it’s all safe. You can find out more detail in the appendix.
So,going into growing year 3, we are having a go at the ‘no dig’ method and have put lots of cardboard down ready to plant directly into the ground in spring.
The tannery cottages have been sold for development, but, with local neighbours, we have managed to claim the gates to the cottage, which are iconic in the Village. The Fletchers bought part of this land in 1914. They were butchers and farmers and owned various bits of land. Greenshaw Drive is named after Robert Greenshaw Fletcher, the last owners grandparents. Fletcher Court was built on land that Robert sold off in the 1990s. When Robert and his wife died in 2000, Jenny inherited the other half of the barn and maintained the gates. Jenny died in 2023. The ‘Dolphin gates’ will be at the entrance to the community garden and have sweetpeas weaving through them as a fragrant welcome to the garden.
Community Involvement
Our community at the garden this year has varied greatly! We like to think of our community as consisting as humans and our non-human friends, so here’s a quick summary of who we’ve seen using the garden this year...
The Human Community
We’ve had babies and toddlers come along from the local nursery to explore nature, classes from the 3 Primary schools in Haxby and Wigginton have come along to plant bulbs, both the Methodist Church youth group and volunteers from St Mary’s Bird Group came down to count the birds during The Big Garden Birdwatch, the staff at the Health Centre often use the garden to have their lunch or for their meetings and we’ve had several repeat visitors from the residents of the Over-55's development across the road.
Food ready to harvest is put on social media for people to collect
Involvement in the local scarecrow festival increased community awareness.
Community Involvement
The Non-Human Community
There has been a whole host of non-human visitors to the garden this year: bugs, bees, hoverflies, cpmmon green shield-bug, hedgehogs, butterflies and many more, but mostly we have been thrilled to see such a variety of birds using the garden! We’ve had Woodpigeons, Black-headed Gulls, Magpies, Blue Tits, Long-tailed Tits, Blackbirds, Goldfinches and many more seen soaring around the garden, perched in the tree tops and using the bird feeders! Our resident Robin, Winter George, has definitely laid claim to the garden too! Our sunflowers were also enjoyed by local pet rabbits! Our policy of planting to encourage biodiversity is certainly paying off!
Volunteers
As the garden is just getting established, our volunteers group is still quite small, but we have loved getting to know some of the keen gardeners from the local area! They’ve been coming down on Friday afternoons or Tuesday mornings for our regular volunteering days to help plant, water and harvest produce from our raised beds.
We’ve also been lucky enough to have 2 volunteer days with staff from the NHS and from Nestle! They’ve come along and done some great work at the garden, including helping to fill our raised beds, putting benches together, creating some compost bins, levelling out some ground for a patio area and doing some general garden maintenance like weeding, grass cutting and pruning!
In October we held a special volunteering session for the community, our Big Garden Tidy Up, where we cracked on with a few of the ‘wintering’ tasks, getting the garden cleared up and ready for the colder months. What started out as a very windy and rainy morning (during which we found out bin bags are great for keeping the wind chill off!) turned into a beautiful, but still cold, Autumn afternoon and we got lots done with the help of some fab volunteers!
Events
We’ve hosted and been part of lots of events this year!
Seed Swap
We’ve hosted seed and plant swaps at the local church, alongside their repair cafe. These have been really useful events for a bit of fundraising, but also to share the story of the garden with the community!
Talks
We were invited to a few places to share the community garden story, including at the Dementia Cafe. We put together a display board and started a Scrapbook to help us share our story with others!
Haxby Carnival
On a very hot July day, the team were at the local Haxby Carnival telling everyone about our garden.
Walk To Gethsemane
During Easter week, we hosted a worship service on Maundy Thursday, led by people from the local churches. It was quiet, peaceful and a great way to connect with nature.
Financials & Policies
Our expenses this year reflect the fact that we concentrating on getting the garden established and growing - we bought a tonne of compost and a cordless electric mower and strimmer which has been a game changer! No more having to have long cables trailing over the grass or use petrol mowers which isn’t really where we want to be as a garden. 3 of the trustees have solar panels at home so we simply take home the batteries after use and charge them up. The other big expense was the soil testing, for which we were given a grant from the City of York Council.
We check our policies at least annually, or more frequently if needed, in response to any new activity or if further information arises. Our aim is always to ensure that absolutely anyone can enjoy the space safely and feel welcomed.
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Donations £82
Grants £500
Total Receipts £582
Public Liability Insurance £100
Gardening Expenses £902
Publicity & Comms £165
Total Payments £1169
Net Receipts in the Year (£587)
Opening bank balance £1091
Closing bank balance £504
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Plans for the coming year
A Sensory Garden and extended Edibles Area
Though they won’t be much to look at over winter since the areas will be covered in old carpet and cardboard, next year we plan to make a start on making a sensory garden and extending our edibles area, now that we can grow fruit and veg in the ground.
The Willow Arch
Signage
Sometimes the important stuff isn’t all that exciting, but we are very pleased that we will be getting new signs to show where we are. Our tucked away position is lovely and peaceful but it is hard to see from the main road.
Whips of willow were donated by NHS Forest and will be trained to meet together in an arch.
Appendix: The Tannery Soil testing
We took advice from the Environment Agency’s contaminated land senior specialist and based our sample suite on the ‘Animal and animal processing works’ industry profile published by CL:AIRE at:
https://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/ukgwa/20140328084622/http://publicatio ns.environment-agency.gov.uk/pdf/SCHO0195BJJV-e-e.pdf
Contaminated Land: Applications in Real Environments (CL:AIRE) is a respected independent not-for-profit organisation established in 1999 to stimulate the regeneration of contaminated land in the UK by raising awareness of, and confidence in, practical and sustainable remediation technologies.
We commissioned Envirochem Ltd. laboratories to analyse for the substances listed in on pp. 15 – 16 of the industry profile for ‘tanneries and fellmongers’, due to the presence of the former tannery on land next to the community garden. Our soil sample was taken next to the boundary with the former tannery (on the west side of the garden) on 2 nd April 2025, and analysed for a topsoil contamination suite including metals commonly associated with tanneries, plus a GCMS (Gas Chromatograph Mass Spectrometer) scan of potential organic contaminants. The results were compared with the safe limits for allotments with consumption of produce – these are screening values published by Land Quality Management (LQM) and the Chartered Institute for Environmental Health (CIEH), which are widely used to assess risk to human health from soil contamination.
The results indicated that all substances were below the screening values. There are some limitations however, as some results are marked with * , these have been noted as ‘non-conforming due to incorrect sample storage or handling’. This could be because the correct sample container wasn’t used, so the results could be invalid. However, given that there are no exceedances of other contaminants typical of historical tanneries, it could possibly be concluded that the results are reflective of the typical values at the site. Also, only one sample was taken, so there is a possibility that the results are not representative of the whole garden, although it is a relatively small area and the sample was taken near the boundary closest to the former tannery.
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