{"id":8019,"date":"2020-08-11T18:18:01","date_gmt":"2020-08-11T17:18:01","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/wenvoe.org.uk\/?p=8019"},"modified":"2020-08-11T18:29:30","modified_gmt":"2020-08-11T17:29:30","slug":"discover-our-5-community-orchards","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/wenvoe.org.uk\/?p=8019","title":{"rendered":"Discover our 5 Community Orchards"},"content":{"rendered":"

Nature Notes<\/span><\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

Discover our 5 Community Orchards<\/span><\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

With more and more people discovering one or more of our 5 Community Orchards, all designed and planted by the Wenvoe Wildlife Group, the question is often raised – What has this got to do with wildlife?<\/p>\n

Orchards are a priority habitat in Biodiversity Action Plans whether at UK Government levels, Welsh Government or Vale of Glamorgan County level. And as with wildflower meadows, what once were common are becoming rarer. Since the 1950s, Britain has lost 90% of its traditional orchards and of those that are left in Wales, 35% are in a poor condition and only 7% excellent.<\/p>\n

Orchards, particularly traditional, established ones, attract many species of wildlife. The obvious ones like Fox, Rabbit, Badger, Blackbird and Thrush take advantage of the fruit but our cameras at the Goldsland Orchard also recorded Greater Spotted and Green Woodpecker, Tawny Owl, Jays, Chiff-chaff and Goldfinch all visiting regularly. And some much rarer species such as Noble Chafer Beetle, Shaggy Bracket Fungus and Red-belted Clearwing Moth are almost exclusively associated with orchards. There is even a European Orchard Bee which only arrived on our shores recently.<\/p>\n

Our orchards, although still young and immature, are already attracting Field Mice and Voles, Moles, Grass Snakes (which do not bite!) and a legion of plants and insects. It is worth distinguishing between traditional orchards where the trees are allowed to live their full lives which may be 100 years or more and are not sprayed with chemicals and commercial ones where the trees are grubbed up after 8 or so years and may be sprayed 20 times a year. The commercial orchards have only minimal wildlife benefit.<\/p>\n

The second reason for planting an orchard is to help conserve the old varieties of apple, pear, plum and cherry along with less common fruit like Medlar, Quince and Mulberry. Names like Catshead (photo) and Tom Putt apples, Jargonelle Pear and Morello Cherry go back hundreds of years.<\/p>\n

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The orchards are also there for you to enjoy thanks to the generosity of farming families like the Readers and the Vale of Glamorgan Council. Orchards have played an important role in our history and literature from the Garden of Eden, through the Romans, Normans, mediaeval monasteries and the fruit-growing bonanza of the 18th and 19th centuries. And when the fruit is getting riper from August onwards why not try sampling the odd apple and let us know your favourite.<\/p>\n

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Nature Notes Discover our 5 Community Orchards With more and more people discovering one or more of our 5 Community Orchards, all designed and planted by the Wenvoe Wildlife Group, the question is often raised – What has this got to do with wildlife? Orchards are a priority habitat in Biodiversity Action Plans whether at UK Government levels, Welsh Government […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}}},"categories":[49],"tags":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p6cWjO-25l","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":8363,"url":"http:\/\/wenvoe.org.uk\/?p=8363","url_meta":{"origin":8019,"position":0},"title":"Community Orchards Resurgence","author":"Alan Williams","date":"5th October 2020","format":false,"excerpt":"NATURE NOTES Community Orchards Resurgence With 5 Community Orchards in the parish we are starting to reclaim some of the ground lost through the wholesale removal of orchards over the last hundred years. In this and future articles we shall consider the origin of orchards, the history of their rise\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Nature Notes"","block_context":{"text":"Nature Notes","link":"http:\/\/wenvoe.org.uk\/?cat=49"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/wenvoe.org.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/10\/Picture5.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/wenvoe.org.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/10\/Picture5.jpg?resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/wenvoe.org.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/10\/Picture5.jpg?resize=525%2C300 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/wenvoe.org.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/10\/Picture5.jpg?resize=700%2C400 2x"},"classes":[]},{"id":7895,"url":"http:\/\/wenvoe.org.uk\/?p=7895","url_meta":{"origin":8019,"position":1},"title":"All About Our Orchards","author":"Alan Williams","date":"3rd July 2020","format":false,"excerpt":"All About Our Orchards What distinguishes the Welsh Orchard (Maes y Felin) from our other community orchards? Well, this year it has more fruit coming along than all the others put together. And why might that be? One major factor has got to be that it has bee hives and\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Nature"","block_context":{"text":"Nature","link":"http:\/\/wenvoe.org.uk\/?cat=46"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/wenvoe.org.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/06\/Ichneumon-sarcitorius-6-20-285x300.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":3206,"url":"http:\/\/wenvoe.org.uk\/?p=3206","url_meta":{"origin":8019,"position":2},"title":"Apples","author":"Alan Williams","date":"1st May 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"\u00a0 If you visit the orchards in May you should still see plenty of blossom around, the majority of the trees being apples. But what is an apple and where does it come from? The first distinction is between the crab-apple and the sweet apple that we eat. The crab\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Nature Notes"","block_context":{"text":"Nature Notes","link":"http:\/\/wenvoe.org.uk\/?cat=49"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":16543,"url":"http:\/\/wenvoe.org.uk\/?p=16543","url_meta":{"origin":8019,"position":3},"title":"Wenvoe Community Wassailing","author":"Alan Williams","date":"29th January 2026","format":false,"excerpt":"Wenvoe Wildlife Group Wenvoe Community Wassailing Mike Tucker has been out and about trimming and laying the hedgerows planted by the Wildlife Group and the Scouts. Another ancient tradition that we have managed to re-establish in the village. Mike has also been crafting and installing rustic props to help secure\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "New Items for February 2026"","block_context":{"text":"New Items for February 2026","link":"http:\/\/wenvoe.org.uk\/?cat=430"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/wenvoe.org.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/Wildlife-Group-2.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":12087,"url":"http:\/\/wenvoe.org.uk\/?p=12087","url_meta":{"origin":8019,"position":4},"title":"\u00a0Seven Green Flag Awards","author":"Alan Williams","date":"5th August 2022","format":false,"excerpt":"Wenvoe Wildlife Group \u00a0Seven Green Flag Awards for 2022!! This is a tribute to all involved with the community sites. The landowners - The Reader family and Vale of Glamorgan Council - make it possible. Without the land we would not have the orchards and meadows for everyone to enjoy.\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Wenvoe Wildlife Group"","block_context":{"text":"Wenvoe Wildlife Group","link":"http:\/\/wenvoe.org.uk\/?cat=48"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/wenvoe.org.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/08\/Picture7j-300x242.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":16509,"url":"http:\/\/wenvoe.org.uk\/?p=16509","url_meta":{"origin":8019,"position":5},"title":"Our First Wassail","author":"Alan Williams","date":"30th December 2025","format":false,"excerpt":"Wenvoe Wildlife Group Celebrating Our Orchards Wenvoe Wildlife Group will be hosting our first Wassail to celebrate our orchards in the Community Orchard on Saturday 17 January, 11.00 am- 12.00 noon at the orchard, followed by celebrations, singing and storytelling in the Community Centre. Wassailing is an ancient new year\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "New Items for January 2026"","block_context":{"text":"New Items for January 2026","link":"http:\/\/wenvoe.org.uk\/?cat=429"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/wenvoe.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8019"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/wenvoe.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/wenvoe.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/wenvoe.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/wenvoe.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=8019"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"http:\/\/wenvoe.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8019\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8022,"href":"http:\/\/wenvoe.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8019\/revisions\/8022"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/wenvoe.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=8019"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/wenvoe.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=8019"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/wenvoe.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=8019"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}