Growing food in an allotment

Speakers: Marta Crispo - PhD candidate, Grantham Centre for Sustainable Futures, The University of Sheffield
Rosie Dunkley - MBiolSci student with Department of Animal and Plant Sciences, The University of Sheffield
Jade Clarke - BA student with Department of Geography, The University of Sheffield
Date: Thursday 8 April 2021, 6pm

You can watch the webinar recording below

Get an allotment and grow your own - Marta Crispo

Some tips to get you started and cultivate your own veggies

One of the most interesting objects I found on my first allotment inspection was a “Grow your own” metal sign reminiscing the “Dig for Victory Campaign” during WWII. I still remember how proud and happy I felt while nailing it on the wall of my shed. From that day, 3 years have passed during which I learnt about the challenges and the benefits of growing your own food in UK allotments. During this talk, I will share some practical tips on growing your own food which I learned during my gardening experience – a non-expert grower prospective. The talk will focus on several aspects of having an allotment: from beds growing practices, glasshouses, wood chips and netting to slugs, pigeons, and cabbages. At the end of the talk, you may have a better idea on what having allotment can mean and you will be ready to start your own growing!

About the speaker: Marta is a PhD researcher at the University of Sheffield and Grantham Centre for Sustainable Futures. Her research focuses on understanding the role of black carbon in urban environments, particularly its influence on soil organic carbon and soil pollutants. She holds a MSc in Environmental Sciences from Wageningen University, the Netherlands and a BSc in Agriculture and Agrotechnology for the Environment from Universita' degli Studi di Milano, Italy. Marta is a student commissioner at the Climate Commission for UK Higher and Further Education and a member of the UKRI Environmental Sustainability Advisory Group. You can often find Marta weeding her garden and allotment, searching for new plants to buy; or experimenting at home with different uses of aromatic herbs and the growth of new plants and flowers.

Allotment gardening - Rosie Dunkley

I got into gardening from a young age, when I remember planting my first flower bed with button daisies and gladioli. My love for growing vegetables started soon after reading guides to self sufficiency and spending weekends at the local garden centre picking out seed packets. Now, I study plant science and germinate seedlings on every window ledge in the house, aiming my walks for a route through the allotments in Sheffield. In my talk I will explain how to use your lateral thinking to problem solve on the allotment and bust the myths that you need the right tools for gardening. I will offer alternative ways of getting seeds methods of cutting the costs of growing your own. I hope to inspire some of you to get out and garden with what you have!

About the speaker: Rosie is a masters student in Plant Science at the University of Sheffield. Her masters is currently focussed on photosynthesis in grassland plants under different nutrient treatments, but has ranged from carbon sequestration techniques in agriculture to food quality in a changing environment. She hopes to tailor her further studies into peri-urban agriculture, highlighting the use of rooftop gardens, allotments and vertical farms. Rosie has worked on the student allotment for going on 4 years and has been a member of Sustainability Committee and Beekeeping society. She is often filling her house with seedlings, experimenting with growing things from her kitchen cupboard and sitting in the allotment recording the birds.

University of Sheffield Allotment Society - Jade Clarke

Jade will talk about what has happened in the allotment that belongs to the University of Sheffield Allotment Society in the last year, the work they have done and how the space has changed. She’ll speak from her own experience of building attachment, responsibility and routine with the space. And she’ll also touch upon the permaculture philosophy and emotional aspect of connecting to land and nature.