Page 48 - ALG Issue 3 2022

North West
Lancashire, Greater Manchester, Merseyside and Cheshire
REPRESENTATIVE
Mr John Irwin
16 Parkdale Ave, Audenshaw, Manchester M34 5LW
0161 3207779 jirwin.nas@gmail.com
MENTOR
Vacant
Contact natsoc@nsalg.org.uk if interested in volunteering with the Region
Fernhurst Allotment
Fernhurst Allotment in Greater Manchester is a fantastic friendly allotment site which boasts great facilities, well run committees and
a group of members who kindly undertake work for the benefit of the plotholders.
They have installed an on-site toilet, built a great kitchen and a pergola under which we sip tea when we need a rest. They have also replaced many
a leaking roof, laid pathways, built foundations for greenhouses and maintained the water pipes. We also have a solar powered store and shop.
At the annual show, which is open to the public, the local mayor and a brass band were in attendance.
We also have a community garden which has been visited by local school children.
All new plotholders receive a booklet with all the things they need to know about the site. We are fortunate to have first aiders whose presence on-site is displayed on a site board. The site has many plotholders who have a wealth of experience and are more than happy to pass on their knowledge and expertise.
And as if all of that was not enough, we also have a weekly flower arranging class!
Welcome to our new members...
Cinder Hill Allotments
1 Individual
Willaston Parish Council
Salford Allotment Federation
In Salford, the Allotment Federation and the Salford City Council are very actively working towards finding more allotments, restoring, or replacing sites that have fallen into dereliction and identifying new allotment sites. Developers are willing to build on brown field sites which are often in close proximity to existing amenities. Developers and city councils have made agreements to ensure that land is made available for leisure facilities and allotments alongside homes.
Before being redeveloped as housing or transforming into parks and gardens, brown field land needs to be
decontaminated and debris cleared. New technologies and industries have been evolving to take on this task. Phytoremediation and phytomining are areas of research that seek to redress contamination as an alternative way
to digging out, burning, and dumping the contaminated soil, laying down membranes and adding clean soil from elsewhere.
Several species of plants have adapted to grow on highly contaminated sites known as metallophytes. Some are ancient, growing where the soil is
rich in certain minerals near to the surface. These are known as indicator
The next question is what to do with the metals in the plants
metallophytes showing where sources of metals lie in the ground. Obligate metallophytes can only survive in the presence of these metals; facultative metallophytes can tolerate high levels of heavy metals but can also grow without them. These specialised plants can be found on old mine spoil heaps and waste ground following demolition of factory sites. Familiar plants are leadwort, alpine pennycress, plantain, sandwort, common bent. Plants we grow in our gardens, such as golden rod, hydrangea, willow and Indian mustard, feature among the plants known to accumulate pollutants. The next question is what to do with the metals in the plants.
48 Allotment and Leisure Gardener