Whitchurch and Llandaff Living Issue 68

FORKS AND TROWELS
How the seed of a community group
took hold and flourished in the village
Madalena Juma talks
to the members of the
Llandaff North and
Gabalfa gardening group
Not far from the River Taff, just
off College Road, lies a little
green haven that is the garden of
the Llandaff North and Gabalfa
Hub. This plot of nature is run by
Forks and Trowels, a cooperative
gardening club that is 11 members
strong.
Forks and Trowels was established
in 2017 through a council scheme
to turn libraries in deprived areas
into ‘hubs’ through money from
housing benefit advice. Wellbeing
Wednesdays were set-up in the
Llandaff North and Gabalfa Hub,
and there was a plan to create a
gardening club to provide produce
for the luncheon club and the Hub’s
cafe.
Sue, a member and organiser of
the group, was called to set up the
10
group, and popped posters around
to recruit people for the project.
Responses came, slowly but surely,
and thus, Forks and Trowels was
born. As Sue puts it:
“You only need one person to kick
start something, before everyone
can join in.”
What Do They Do?
The group frequently provides
produce for the cafe (and any extra
can be taken home by members).
This can include blackberries,
beetroots, potatoes, tomatoes, and
onions, to name only but a few!
They run a three-year crop rotation
system to keep things varied and
interesting every year.
Prior to COVID, they organised
visits to other gardens (Chapter, Ely,
and Hollybush), engaged with the
‘Have a Grow Day’ Cardiff scheme
to promote gardens for school
children, and the Keep Cardiff Tidy
scheme. They also sold Christmas
trees to the general public, put up
a memory tree where people left
messages for their dearly departed,
hosted a summer picnic, and also
invited children around during halfterm
to learn about bird-feeders.
Even everyday
household objects
can be repurposed
for sustaining life