March marks the coming of spring in many northern hemisphere cultures. In Persian tradition, the start of March sees preparations towards their new year festivities of Nowruz around the spring equinox. At this time, Iranians traditionally plant trees and venerate apples especially as symbols of fertility for the year ahead.
Join us in Huntly for this day long, local-global programme celebrating the new life inherent in seeds. We'll be looking to extend this celebration to fruiting trees, through maintenance work and possible planting as a continuation of the Future Fruit project's reimagining of the town's community orchard.1
On the run up….
Thurs 5 + Fri 6 Mar
2 – 4pm, Community Orchard, The Meadows
Orchard Care and Maintenance. Join us down at the community orchard to help with a little orchard maintenance and care. We will be pruning the apple trees, mulching under all the fruit trees and any other general care work. A good opportunity for anyone wanting to practice their pruning skills and/or learn more about the caring of an orchard. Weather permitting / bring warm clothes and any pruning tools you have.
On the day…
Sat 7 Mar
9am-1pm, Huntly Farmers Market, Huntly Square
Launch of the Strathbogie Seed Collective: A community seed library. Come along to find out about what a seed library is, how you can get involved and to meet the library's new curator Dawn Finch. The seed library will be hosted by Orb's community bookshop. To mark the launch we will be sharing seeds.
2 – 3pm, Community Orchard, The Meadows
Orchard Tree planting with Future Fruit. Join us to plant 3 apple trees in the community orchard, a tree to represent the past, present and future of the orchard. Come along to find out more about the orchard and if you are interested in being a part of its future. And there might just be another appearance of Patrick Geddes…
6.30pm-9pm, Neep & Okra Kitchen, 8 Castle Street
Neep & Okra Kitchen x Town is the Garden Pop-up Meal + Film Screening. Join us for the next iteration of our monthly film and food night.
Food: a menu inspired by seeds and orchards, from the Neep & Okra Kitchen.
Film: Wild Relatives, Dir. Jumana Manna, 2018
With political crisis in Syria, the contents of the Aleppo seed bank must be reconstructed afresh in order to preserve the region's precious genetic plant heritage in the face of civil war and climate change. Check out the trailer.
Booking essential, £5 suggested donation.
Image credit: Jumana Manna
1. The existing orchard is made up of two separate groups of fruit trees planted by artist Norma Hunter, through her Bite on the Side project, and Networks of Wellbeing.
