The Cake - Summer 2022

LOCAL COMMENT
Hon. Mayor
Linda Page’s
June message
It’s great to see the public
toilets in Crane Lane open
again. Many thanks to the
parish council. Hopefully,
the tired mosaic seat will
be moved soon to a temporary
place for repair and TLC, with it
then being found a place to be
displayed in the long term. It is a
lovely piece of art that needs to
be saved.
Please get involved again this
year by helping the bees and
supporting my two important
and well deserving charities, the
Sam West Foundation and Motor
Neurone Disease Association.
Donations can be made at
Cranbrook Farm Shop, Larkins
Ale House, Anderson’s Butchers,
Cranbrook DIY, TN17 Food &
Wine, Cranbrook Service Station
and Pages Newsagents. You
can pick up sunflower seeds,
wildflower seeds and bee bombs.
It’s not too late to sow your
sunflower or wildflower seeds,
or you may prefer to keep your
wildflower seeds for autumn
sowing and an early spring
display.
I’m sure most gardeners can
already identify a pollinator
plant in their borders, tubs,
planters or maybe your lawn,
so please go online and register
your postcode. Be included
on the bee corridor map of
Cranbrook & Sissinghurst. The
local maps will be updated
throughout the summer
showing where the butterflies
and bees will travel through
our parish. Please visit www.
bringonthebees.uk to find out
more.
We are very fortunate to have
so many events organised in the
town over the next few months.
Please support them and enjoy
everything that’s thrown at us.
Have a great summer!
Guy's Column
Hands of Hope sets the standard for healthy soil
There can be few more idyllic
settings for a vegetable garden
than the new growing field at
Hope Farm Community Garden in
Hawkhurst. Right now we garden
to the bleat of lambs and the cry of buzzards
above, while the orchard next door sends
flurries of blossom onto the newly-made beds.
We garden our acre of vegetables by hand,
using no-dig methods which don’t disturb
the soil so all the life within stays intact and
functioning. Our soil is heavy clay, but it is
also full of bacteria, protozoa, fungi, viruses
and millions of other life forms, most of which
are too small to see, but all of which play a
vital role in the functioning of good soil.
All the minerals and nutrients that a plant
needs to grow can be found in our heavy
mineral clay, but to become available to the
plant, the web of life needs to eat and excrete,
to live and die. Only when that life flourishes
will plants thrive and over time our soil will
get more nutrient-rich as these symbiotic
relationships get stronger.
We feed our soil with green waste compost
made from council garden waste collections.
It is not great quality for putting in pots, but
it has all the organic matter that the soil web
needs to thrive. We also aim to have plants in
the soil at all times as plants and their roots
are a vital part of the soil’s web of life.
During the past 70 years or so, we have
ploughed and dug land on an industrial scale
which has destroyed its life force. Naturallyoccurring
nutrient levels are decreasing in
industrially farmed fields, so farmers need
to add more and more chemical fertilizers
to keep the plants growing. This isn’t just
the fault of farmers. As a society, we have
benefited from cheap food without wondering
at the cost to the earth, our health or to the
long-term viability of production.
At Hands of Hope, we believe that healthy
soil = healthy plants = healthy humans. With
the help of our army of volunteers, we grow
vegetables for food banks, lunch clubs and
community projects as well as for our own
veg box scheme. Our organic vegetables come
powered by the soil and are full of nutrients.
They’re also delicious!
Guy Pullen, HoH head of horticulture
20 The Cake • Summer 2022