Over the past few years, WDR supporters John and Jan Corrie have established ‘Drumhilla Garden’ at their home in Co. Fermanagh.
Their garden comprises of fruit and vegetable beds, an orchard, a polytunnel and is home to a number of chickens and ducks. As well as growing their own food, John and Jan welcome visitors to their garden to learn how to “live lightly on the planet”.
In our latest blog, John shares the vision behind the garden and how their care for creation shapes their gardening methods.

Jan and I have moved many times in our married life, because of my jobs in special education and ministry.  We have both always enjoyed gardening and there has always been the ground around our home and sometimes an allotment to allow us to grow things.  During these years and moves we began to dream of our 'forever home', a place we wouldn’t have to move away from and would allow us to grow as much of our own food as possible. At times we thought it might be a derelict Victorian walled garden to revive, but that was not to be. 

Instead, it turned out to be a modern bungalow with a 'garden' laid to grass and an adjoining field running to scrub.  Not everyone's dream retirement project. And so, ‘Drumhilla Garden’ was born.

Our first project was in the 'pleasure garden'. We reused some raised beds we had installed at the Donegal manse and re-installed them in Fermanagh.  This involved stripping off the turf, and stacking it for later use as loam, setting up the raised beds and then forming paths around them. Later on we installed more raised beds for fruit and vegetables, a polytunnel and planted fruit trees in the field.

Since 'Organic' is a legal term with conditions attached to it, we do not claim to be 'organic' although we do not use chemicals on site: the improvement in soil structure and fertility is achieved by using loads of homemade compost.

There have been times in my life when I have suffered from stress-induced depression and at these times gardening has been part of my recovery.  I have benefited from time given freely by those who offer their time and facilities through 'Social Farming'.  It seemed right to us that, if we could, we would offer others a similar opportunity at Drumhilla Garden.

There were some hoops to get through for this to be possible, from joining the new UK wide organisation 'Social Farms and Gardens' (SoFaG) (easy), to making contact with those who would prescribe social farming on both side of the border (difficult), to arranging insurance cover for us and the garden to operate responsibly (very difficult).  When all was in place, we officially opened in October 2019 just before the first Covid lockdown in February 2020. Not the best timing for inviting people into the garden.

During the time we were not able to invite people into the garden, SoFaG received government funding to roll out a programme to encourage people/families to take up gardening, called Lock-Down Gardening.  We became a hub for this initiative and made contact with 28 families, 1 college and 2 pre-school playgroups.  At this time Jan started our Drumhilla Garden Facebook page to keep in contact with them all. Between the lockdowns we filled a gap in summer activity provision by running a children’s summer gardening club and in the second lockdown SoFaG received funds for a second gardening scheme based around families growing soft fruit, taking cuttings and passing them on - in which we participated.  With each initiative our group of contacts/friends/followers increased – moving beyond these shores to other countries, by the ‘grace’ of social media.

The physical health benefits of gardening such as being in the fresh air, engaging in physical activity, the vitamin D production from being in the sunshine as well as eating fresh vegetables are all well documented.  The mental health benefits are also well known: being aware of what is around us and the changing of the seasons; planning and seeing through a project over a period of time; breathing the endorphins emitted by a healthy soil; mixing with others.  Growing your own food has much to recommend it.

Our local environment gains as well: we aim to garden with only natural inputs which also benefits the local biodiversity. Use of stored rainwater reduces the use of much processed water – which has a cost in terms of our island’s limited power and water resources.

As more people visit the garden and others ask questions via email and Facebook as to why we do what we do (like making lots of compost and not using artificial fertilisers) we are being given the opportunity to lay out our belief in a creating God who sees what has been created as good, both the soil and the humans, and that we have a responsibility of good stewardship to do what we can to look after all of creation and all of humanity and to pass on to our children a planet that is as healthy and well balanced as it can be. 

We trust that, by example and conversation, on many aspects including the benefits and pleasure of growing your own food, reduction of waste, food miles, composting and soil health we are encouraging others to think and act in such a way that our local actions have a far more wide-reaching impact.