Grow Your Own is the Abingdon Green Forum focus for quarter 2 of 2024, from April to June. This is the best time of year to get started with growing herbs and vegetables. A stall on the Market place had free veg seedlings. There will be another stall in two weeks time where people can swap plants.

Volunteers were planting the containers and raised beds at the Edible Abingdon Garden at Old Station House today where there was an open day. Volunteers will maintain the plants over the summer.

Many of the residents from Old Station House were enjoying the sunshine and some cakes and tea, while staff showed visitors round parts of Old Station House.

The Edible Abingdon display shows how much can be grown in containers and small gardens and even balconies. They included:

Herbs: Parsley, Chives, Melissa (Lemon Balm), Bay, Lovage, Mint

Vegetables: Mangetout, Beans, Sorrel, Swiss Chard

Fruits: Rhubarb, Currant bushes

Edible Flowers: Marigolds, Pansies, Nasturtiums

2023 was the worst year on record for stormwater pollution. Stormwater pollution occurs when rain washes pollutants into waterways. These can include litter, chemicals, and raw sewage from overflowing drains. It’s especially bad when treatment plants have insufficient capacity to handle the rainwater.

The Ock area had 747 spillages in 2023, compared to 155 in 2022. Some of those spillages came down the River Ock from places like Wantage(78) and Uffington(86), then went into the River Thames. Others went directly into the River Thames. The Abingdon treatment works had 38 spillages in 2023 and 0 in 2022.

The rivers in the north of England were the worst offenders.

Thanks to Newcomer for pointing out a Guardian article: Englands sewage crisis – How polluted is your local river?. It has a tool for analysing the number of spillages in a year by area. The picture is taken from that tool (all rights reserved).

There was a One Planet Abingdon stall on the Market Place today. The focus from January – March 2024 is Waste Reduction. On the website https://oneplanetabingdon.org/green-forum/ there is a survey on Waste Reduction which takes about 5-10 minutes to complete. They also have four waste reduction challenges people can take on.

Their base in the County Hall basement is open from Thursday to Saturday and most Sundays. There are homemade cakes, teas and coffees, soup, friendly volunteers happy to chat, displays on sustainability, an eco-library, and board games and puzzles.

Sunshine and 12 volunteers joined Lynne from AbiBinit to tackle litter in South Abingdon’s Caldecott area.

People had mixed reactions. A young woman was happy about the cleared hedge by the Reynolds Way supermarket, saying “Thanks so much! It was minging!” Another person said the rubbish would be back again in no time. Someone asked who they were, and when they learned they were volunteers, said the council should do it, not volunteers.

After 2 hours, the volunteers had filled 26 bags with rubbish.

Town Councillor Tom Greenaway (who also volunteered) thanked Lynne with a letter from the Mayor and council for all their hard work. AbiBinit has been cleaning up Abingdon since 2018, and encouraging volunteering, first with Helen and now with Lynne. Check them out at https://abingdoncivicsociety.org.uk/activities/abibinit-litter-picking-initiative.