EarthShare

25/09/2025

🌳 Why Aren’t We Planting More Food Forests in the South West?

Living here in the South West—especially from an urban lens—you can’t help but notice the tension between well-meaning environmental strategies and the messy reality on the ground. We’ve got green infrastructure projects sprouting up, pollinator corridors zigzagging through city parks, and biodiversity plans that often clash with efforts to manage invasive non-native species. It’s a noble effort, but it can feel fragmented, even contradictory.

And yet, there’s a quietly powerful alternative: community-led food forests. These aren’t just trendy permaculture experiments—they’re deeply rooted in cultural evolution and ecological resilience. In fact, research shows that food forest systems, especially those shaped by Indigenous and local knowledge, can rival or even exceed conventional conservation strategies in biodiversity. They don’t just preserve nature—they live with it, feed people, and regenerate ecosystems.

Here’s the kicker: many of our urban green spaces are dominated by ornamental or non-native species that, while attractive, often support only a handful of generalist wildlife and vertually no human benefit other than aesthetics. Think evergreen oaks, sycamores, cherry laurels, or rhododendrons—plants that look lush but offer little ecological value. In contrast, food forests integrate native, non-native and useful species—hazels, elder, wild garlic, apples and all the fruit under the sun—creating layered habitats that support pollinators, birds, fungi, and humans alike.

So why aren’t we planting more of them?

🛠 Barriers include:

Policy inertia: Conservation often defaults to “leave it wild,” even when “wild” means monocultures of invasive species.

Urban planning silos: Food production and biodiversity are treated as separate goals, when they could be beautifully integrated.

Lack of awareness: Many still see food forests as niche or experimental, not as scalable infrastructure.

But here in the South West, we’ve got the perfect ingredients: community spirit, a mild climate, and a growing appetite for regenerative practices. Imagine transforming underused green spaces into edible ecosystems—places where biodiversity thrives alongside berries, herbs, and nut trees. It’s not just possible. It’s practical.

Let’s stop treating food and forests as separate conversations. The future of urban ecology might just taste like elderflower cordial and smell like wild rosemary and lemon balm.

Agroforestry systems in Latin America practised by local communities are a boon to biodiversity, according to research

24/09/2025

🦋 Wings and Thanks

Can you see me?

For the EarthSharer:

I wandered through the fading light, a dancer in the air’s soft flight. The world below was fresh and wide— a patch of bark, a place to hide.

I saw your gift, a mulch so new, a bed of browns, a gentle hue. I landed there, my wings aglow, a flash of thanks before I go.

Then closed my cloak of mottled shade, and vanished where your hands had laid. You gave me rest, I gave you grace— a quiet bond in nature’s space.

For the butterfly:

I sifted compost, bit by bit, bark and discarded plastic, soil and grit. I spread the mulch with care and pride, and watched the garden open wide.

No sooner had I turned away, she came to rest, to end her day. A peacock wing, a burst of light— then folded into evening’s night.

She thanked me with her silent show, then vanished where the bark lay low. She found her peace in what I gave— and I found mine in how she stayed.

Can you see her?

17/09/2025

😉 Treloggan Residents Association Newquay Town Council

17/09/2025

🌱 FREE FOOD ALERT — Straight from clean, local earth.

🌿 THE REAL FOOD BANK IS OPEN — and the snails are circling! 🐌💚

Nature’s generosity is overflowing at Polwhele Permaculture Gardens, and it’s all FREE for the community to share. Grown from the earth with help only from sunshine, soil, and time — no chemicals, no catch.

Come and harvest:

🐍 Serpent & Trombone squashes

🥒 Zucchini courgettes

🍅 Tomatoes bursting with flavour

🍇 Boskop Glory grapes — the sweetest you’ve ever tasted

🥝 Hardy kiwi (Chinese gooseberry)

🍃 Rhubarb ready for your crumble dreams

🍌 And don’t miss the banana circle — it’s thriving like never before!

📍 Find us at Polwhele Permaculture Gardens, Polwhele Road, public open access. Please shut the gates behind you 🤲 Take what you need, leave some for others — and for nature

This is EarthShare in action — where the only thing we stockpile is carbon and kindness. Let’s squash hunger together (pun intended). Come and get it before the snails do!

10/09/2025

Check out these lovely Beurre Hardy pears. These are from a local garden but hopefully they will grow out of Polwhele very soon.

23/08/2025

Such an amazing plant. How our British wildflowers end up on acts designed to eradicate in order only to keep Britain tidy, I do wonder.

22/08/2025

🌱 Permaculture Gardens Update 🌿

Our permaculture gardens have been receiving some much-needed care lately, and we’re thrilled to see the project gaining momentum again! Huge thanks to Newquay Town Councils Open Spaces team, who’ve been working tirelessly to bring things back on track.

At our nursery plot at Fairpark, fruit bushes are thriving, and the nitrogen-fixing trees generously donated by the Treloggan Residents Association are coming along beautifully. If all goes well, they’ll be ready for planting this autumn 🍂

We’re hoping to host a communal planting day—ideally at the end of September. However, if summer lingers and the trees hold onto their leaves, we may need to wait a little longer to ensure the conditions are just right. After all, we want to give these trees the best possible start on what is a challenging site.

Stay tuned for updates and planting day details—we’d love for you to be part of it 🌳💚

And please check food free for the taking in the no-dig garden. There should be grapes, Chinese gooseberries and annual fruits coming along nicely. Take what you need, leave some for others and don't forget to leave a little for the wildlife.

Photos, English Alder, Italian Alder and Joster berries on our nursery plot.

06/05/2025

Update to share please. We have had confirmation that Companies House has agreed with our application to strike EarthShare CIC off the register. Please report any land management or anti-social behavioural concerns at Polwhele Permaculture Gardens to Newquay Town Council who are responsible for upholding the 106 obligations on the land. Our decision follows a pattern of reluctance of local leaders to mitigate issues at the permaculture gardens which impedes our ability to raise an income for the community. But on a positive note, here is a lovely food forest flourishing, the way Polwhele should be by now, at Eden.

25/04/2025

But does this alteady happen unofficially?

Exclusive: plan to let firms sidestep environmental laws by paying into nature levy would add cost and delay, says letter to MPs

24/04/2025

Such a shame our local kids are missing out of this kind of thing woth lack of support from our local authorities and land manager.

24/04/2025

Devastating news and I guess.means thousands of us in the ecological industries out of a job. Watch out, Mr Housing for Cornwall will have his eyes on our last green spaces.

The horrifying planning bill, which rips up environmental protections, was drafted with CEOs in mind. We know because Keir Starmer told us, says Guardian columnist George Monbiot

05/04/2025

People might think that we have something against dog walkers but it's not true. Infact, custodians of Polwhele are part of the dog walking community. There are a small minority that abuse our green spaces and give us a bad name. It's not just about hygiene or making it difficult to grow food or play, it's also about impacts on wildlife

Birds that are disturbed during breeding season can abandon their nest, nature presenter says.