27 Sep, 2022 Community Creations Products in use
ABOUT GROW 73
Through shared gardening activities, environmental improvements and events, they aim to bring together diverse groups across the age and ethnic spectrum to support and learn from each other as well as improve the health and wellbeing of the community and make Rutherglen the place to be.
And to help them achieve their goals, they’ve been using lots of reclaimed timber and some of our reclaimed scaffold board products. See below to see what they’ve been up to…
THE BEE LINE PROJECT
In Spring of last year, Grow 73 made a purchase of reclaimed oak whisky casks (22 planters and 2 whole in total!) to be used as part of their ongoing project, the Bee Line Project.
Using these barrel planters they created little green oases of nectar rich plants for our amazing pollinators to feed on as they travel around the city. Linking the barrels together, they estimate to have covered an area of around 6.2km.
Through establishing these pollination stations, they also created long lasting partnerships with schools, sports clubs, health centres, nurseries and other like-minded organisations. The plan is to continue expanding the Bee Line with more stations, gaining more connections and partnerships along the way.
With the help of some publicity from a special Countryfile episode, we imagine this definitely helped their cause. One of the barrel planters was even signed by their presenter, Charlotte Smith!
DISUSED BOWLING GREENS TO COMMUNITY GARDENS
March 2022 saw Grow 73’s biggest purchase: 13 raised beds (in various sizes) and 45 Scottish spruce sleepers to assemble some of their own raised beds! These were all for a piece of newly acquired land through an asset transfer from South Lanarkshire council.
BUZZFEST 2022
In June, over 600 people turned up to Buzzfest, and so did the weather! These photos show some of the team planting the first young plants. And thanks to the great summer we had, just over 6 weeks later they were able to begin taking their first harvest.
Eugenie, Grow 73’s main co-ordinator said:
With this in mind and lots of fun activities available on the day, it definitely seemed to be a success amongst the many friends and family who came along to the festival. There was live music, storytelling and face-painting. It was also a great collaboration with other local businesses, individuals and organisations.
Here you can see our reclaimed whisky barrels in action in a whole range of ways!
They have a big family of volunteers and run twice-weekly growing sessions, and it seems like they’re going from strength to strength. Here you can see they planted cherry trees, kindly donated by one of their volunteers, in some of our reclaimed whisky barrel planters.
RUNNING OUT OF TIME RELAY
Grow 73 are supporting an extraordinary 7,767km non-stop relay from Scotland to Egypt. It’s a journey which carries a climate change message from young people to the decision makers at COP27.
As the COP26 host of 2021, a handful of Glasgow locations are hosting the beginning of the relay. There’s 732 individual stages of the relay, running day and night for 38 days across 18 countries. Grow 73 are stage 5!
The COP27 baton will be at Grow 73 in Overtoun Park at 4.20PM, where the media will be given chance to have a look around their amazing work.
Then at 5.15PM, they will resume normal programming for their AGM, followed by food & drinks at Overtoun Bowling Club at 5.30PM.
They welcome you to come and bring your children, bring your instruments, and show some support if you have chance.
