Fruitful

Blossom time in Lower Ouseburn April 2022

Nestled between huge and over spanning bridges, Lower Ouseburn hosts wildlife and domesticated animals in the hugely popular City Farm.

Recently serious maintenance work has been undertaken on one of the developing projects, an orchard of fruit trees. Planted few years ago these were pretty difficult to locate. Earlier work on boardwalks over some splashy places had become dilapidated and numerous other plants and herbs had grown to obscure the fruit trees. Now a lot has been carried out. New gates, wheelchair friendly paths, and much clearing away of overgrowth to reveal the steadily developing fruit trees are still there and thriving. Two ponds replace one, and fencing makes it possible for grazing to occur, that will, in turn, suppress the more aggressive plants and allow an more meadow like flora to develop.

Storms rent through the Lower Ouseburn and many trees, shallow rooted on that thin soil produced by in-filling in the 19th century, were brought down. But most survive and already plants are taking advantage of the opening up to sunlight clearance by Nature's Hand has produced.

Photo gallery here. (off site link)