Happy new year to you all! Our first meeting of 2024 will be on Saturday January 13th at 10.30 in Airfield House. This will be a very informal meeting as we discuss jobs that can be done in the garden in January and discuss our plans for our gardens for the year. If you have any seeds that you can spare (even if they are out of date) please bring them along for swopping.

If you like to put the GIY meetings into your diary then here are the list of meeting dates: Jan 13th, Feb 10th, March 9th, April 13th, May 11th, June 8th, July 13th, August 10th, Sept 14th, Oct 12th, Nov 9th.

Hi everyone - sorry for the late notice this month. Tomorrow (11th November) is the second Saturday so we will meet as usual in Airfield at 10.30. No special plans for tomorrow but we haven't had a chance to chat about our own gardens and vegetables for a while so it will be nice to have an opportunity to do that. Looking forward to seeing you then.

The next GIY Dundrum meeting will be on October 14th in Airfield at 10.30. One of the Airfield staff is going to talk to us about their community garden plans. It will also be a great opportunity for us to review our growing successes and failures (including the mystery of the disappearing fruit). If anyone has saved seeds that they can spare we can do some swapping.

Looking forward to seeing you all on October 14th - we will meet at the ticket desk just before 10.30.

The next GIY Dundrum meeting will be on September 9th in Airfield at 10.30. For this month's meeting we have arranged a foraging walk with Adam one of the Airfield staff. We last had a foraging walk two years ago and I think that everyone who took part found it very enjoyable and informative.

We have to pay for this event - the cost is €8 per head but this is a good way for us to give back to Airfield for the free use of their education cabins every month.

Looking forward to seeing you all on September 9th - we will meet at the ticket desk just before 10.30.

We won't have a meeting in Airfield House on August 12th, as we are visiting a member's garden but we will be back to our regular meeting slots in September with a meeting in Airfield on the 9th.

The next meeting of GIY Dundrum will be on Saturday next (July 8th) at 10.30 in Airfield House. We look forward to seeing you all and new comers are always welcome. If you ask at the ticket desk you will be directed to the education cabins where we meet. We don't have a speaker this month but it is always great to swop stories about our growing successes and failures and to get advice from one another. As usual, spare seeds and seedling or plants are most welcome for swopping.

Unfortunately we have had to cancel the meeting that was originally scheduled for next Saturday June 10th. However I hope that many of you will be able to make the meeting on July 8th - more details on that meeting closer to the time.

This will be a busy weekend for GIY Dundrum. We have our usual monthly meeting on Saturday 13th at 10.30 in Airfield House (2nd Saturday of the month) where we will discuss our successes and failures and swop seeds and seedlings. We are then visiting the community garden Fernhill (https://www.dlrcoco.ie/en/parks/fernhill-park-and-gardens) on Sunday 14th at 10.30 and will have a guided tour. Looking forward to seeing you at one or both of the events.

The next meeting of GIY Dundrum is on Saturday next, April 15th in Airfield at 10.30. We are delighted to welcome John Kelleher from Santry Community Garden (https://santrycommunitygarden.ie/ ) who will give us an overview of the garden: how it came into being; how it is funded; its organisation, structure and model; as well as what is grown (and how this is decided), what facilities and features it has, etc. John has been actively involved in the garden since 2012. Please also bring along any spare seeds, seedlings or plants that you would like to share/swop.

Hello everyone. The next meeting of GIY Dundrum will be on Saturday March 11th at 10.30. We are delighted to welcome John and Shanti from the Grow Shop in Navan (https://www.growshop.ie/) who will talk to us about the fundamentals of hydroponic growing. They will show us different types of systems suitable for hobby gardeners.

John and Shanti will be bringing a water testing kit with them so if you bring a sample of your home tap water they will be able to tell you whether your water is hard/soft etc. and the implications for hydroponic growing.

Hydroponic growing allows for faster growth and higher yields than traditional soil-based growing systems. To grow hydroponically, you need plants, a container, water, a way to anchor the plants, nutrients and a light source. It is possible to grow vegetables hydroponically both outdoors and indoors.(https://extension.umn.edu/ )

Looking forward to seeing you all on the 11th.

Hi everyone you may be interested in an event in Airfield on March 4th. It is all about organic food (eating rather than growing I think) but there are interviews with organic farmers, dish tasting and opportunities to meet producers. It seems to be an EU project with Teagasc involved. You can book (free) on airfield.ie/events.

Only one of the events in this programme is listed on the Airfield website but given the timing I assume that if you book for the one named event you get to attend the whole thing!

Put March 11th in your diary for the next GIY meeting - more information will be posted closer to the date.