Fancy some veg gardening with a group of other people – or need a small allotment of your own ?

NHTT have a Community Garden in co-operation with Monimail Tower Project.  And we have space for other individuals or families that want to be involved.  Take an allotment or garden together.

The venue is the 19th century walled garden at Monimail Tower.  It has great soil, is well protected from wind and frosts!  We have two polytunnels as well!

Cost is £15/year payable to MTP.  Contact garden@nhtt.org.uk or phone 07580 699881

Free compost is now available to householders in the area.  NHTT has arranged for compost (soil conditioner) to be provided free of charge by Fife Council. Monimail Tower Project have kindly agreed to host the  stockpile at the edge of their car park.

The 1-2-3 of getting your compost:

1. Turn up at Monimail Tower Project car park (behind the wall opposite the green at Monimail )

2.  Help yourself, no need to ask. The stockpile is signposted.

3. Take home and garden !

Why is NHTT doing this ?

We have are providing this to the community for 2 main reasons:

- to promote gardening including for growing veg,

- to encourage peat-free composts. Draining peatlands to harvest peat is major issue for climate change.

More on peat-free gardening. and here

http://www.bbc.co.uk/gardening/today_in_your_garden/ethical_peat.shtml

More on why peatlands matter especially in Scotland

http://www.iucn-uk-peatlandprogramme.org/

Where does the compost come from ?

It is a high quality product produced by Fife Council from the green material collected in the brown bins together with other horticultural materials.  It is tested comply with British Standard PAS 100 (contact us for a copy of the test certificate).  The heat of the compost process kills weed seeds and other bugs.  It gets up to 70 degrees C !

Fair Use

Max 250kg per household; for non-commercial home use in the Giffortown, Collessie and Monimail Community Council areas.

Core Group Minutes 14th March 2013

20130314coregroupminutes

Errata:  The minutes state that Cathy Bache has left the Woodland Group. It should state that  she is no longer leading the Sunday Woodland Group due to her other commitments.

This is a post to report that the Core Group met with Ladybank Development Trust last week for a friendly chat adn to get to know each other.

Our bounadries and activities are very close and we discussed items of mutual interest, including:

• woods, for recreation, wildlife and fuel
• Fife Council Melville recycling site, and the potential for a community-led energy project there,
• the need to manage gravel quarries for public interest, especially restoration landscaping and access arrangements after use
• broadening the market for the Community Bakery

LDT are currently looking at community gardens and Hall facilities. We had a friendly meeting and I think we will look to perhaps take some of the items forward through further dicussion. Irrespective of whether these go anywhere, it is good to develop relationships with our neighbouring community organisations

Let me know if you have any comments on this by posting

Cheers, Tom Morton, NHTT Chair

We’ve been sent info on a new scheme that might save you money on your bills - looks like a good one, so check it out. We get sent lots of energy info, but I only post the ones that look good. The blurb is below and I’ve loaded a couple of info sheets HouseholderFAQs and Scots Together Briefing.

Scots Together – saving on energy, together

Rising energy bills mean it’s more important than ever to check your energy tariffs regularly and switch to get a better deal.

 Scots Together, part of UK Together, wants to make it easy for people living in Scotland to get a better deal on energy prices by joining together and combining your buying power.  The more people that join, the better the deal for everyone.

 From 18 February to 17 March 2013, you can check if the group deal will save you money, here’s how:

1. Grab a recent energy bill.
2. Go online to scotstogether.com
3. Enter your details and have a look at the deal we’ve organised by getting lots of people like you together to bulk buy electricity and gas. The more people that sign up, the better the deal becomes. If there’s a different deal that’s better for you or you’re already on the best possible price then we’ll be sure to let you know. We’ll also offer an option for energy from a more sustainable source.
4. Decide whether to switch or not. There is no obligation. If you would like to switch you’ll need to accept the offer by 17 March 2013.
5. Pass it on – don’t forget to tell your family and friends! The more people that sign up, the better the deal for everyone.

If you’d like talk to an advisor first or you don’t have easy internet access, you can call the Scots Together freephone advice line on 0800 408 0155.

 Scots Together is open to everyone, it’s impartial and there’s no obligation to switch, so you’ve absolutely nothing to lose by going to scotstogether.com and checking.

 Get Together. Save Money. Pass It On.

The Community Garden at Monimail Tower Project is beginning to stir from hibernation.  On Sunday 17th Feb, we’re going to plant some cordon fruit trees against an unused section of wall in our wee corner.  The trees have been purchased from Auchtermuchty’s finest pomologist Gerben de Vries.  Last year was a dreadful year for orchard fruit throughout Scotland and the north of England.  However, the cordons at Monimail were some of the few that were seen to do well.  Cordons are the single stem form that are trained at an inclined angle.  So NHTT’s community garden folk are going to get some more cordons in the ground in the hope of emulating this success.   Come along between 10am – 3pm if you fancy helping or just to see what is happening.

Other Monimail events are also in the flyer below:

Improving prospects to report on our existential crisis with the Leader grant. John, Neil Crispin and I met with the Scottish Government and Fife Council a couple of weeks ago in Letham Hall and they basically accepted that Leader doesn’t work for community groups and we are now working through the detail. We hope to receive the grant money before Christmas.

I attach minutes from the meeting here and from our Co-Group meeting here

Otherwise, the Bakery has been going well and the Wood group is pressing on. I am assured they will post soon on this.

Yo Ho Ho and other seasonal wishes!  Tom

NHTT cHAIR

We’ve been a bit lax in updates recently, holidays, illnesses the usual things, but NHTT stuff’s still been happening..

The Good News is that NHTT Members Becky Little and Paula Cowie have been successful in raising £1500 for a project with the Parent Teacher Council to develop Outdoor Learning facilities at Letham Primary School. Horray!!

The Grant is from a private charitable trust, the Tudor Trust. More info to follow, but another good example of members using NHTT as a vehicle to deliver popular improvements for our community in partnership with other organisations.

The Bad News is that we have been having problems with the Leader funding for the Paths to Transition project. An audit of Fife Council’s files by the Scottish Government found administrative aspects of the approved grant claims that they felt were not documented in a way fully complying with Leader rules and payment of grants was suspended as a result. After support from our Councillors and MSP, we have had a series of meetings and have resolved some of the issues, but NHTT has been unable to pay some of its suppliers in time as a result. These suppliers are being patient with us and we have another meeting soon with the Scottish Government and Fife Leader to try and finally resolve the issues.

There is no question of the project outcomes not being a good one, or of fraud, but the Leader admin requirements are rather extreme and we may simply be unable to comply fully with them. As a consequence it is possible that NHTT may be unable to pay its debts and have to close as a result.

All the Directors and Crispin, as project maanger, have been working very hard with Fife Leader to avoid this outcome and things should be clearer in a couple of weeks, but it is important that we advise members of the situation and we’ll update you when we know more.

I other news, the Wood Group has had a good meeting recently and will post on this soon, I am assured.

and the Energy Group will post the date of a meeting soon as well.

Right time for bed now.

Cheers, Tom

NHTT Chair

We had a great AGM at Giffordtown Hall recently. Chair Tom gave a cheery summary of the years efforts and looked forward to all the stuff that’s going on and coming up. Treasurer Crispin gave a good summary of our financial situation and prospects. It’s all sumarised in one easy-to-read, fun-filled report,

no really it’s worth reading, just click on the link