Posts

Lets get making our streets and estates into urban orchard for everyone to have free fresh food!

Great communal day

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 Yesterday I took a group of people around the estate picking apples and to show them many of our other phantom planted trees we have. With the hot summer we had so many of the apple trees are ripening early. Many people went away with bags of apples and we were non stop eating apples the whole day straight of the trees.  Then I get a nice message from a lady who seen me out tending to her apple tree that we phantom planted a few years ago in memory of her dad saying thank you for the apple tree, the love, connection and memories your apple tree has given us will go on for generations.  I have always said her apple tree is one of the best in the estate. Its the one in the pic with the wooden surround and me bent over. I notice that the trees that get shown the most love and attention grow better than others.  The more light you shine, the more shadows you cast.  From the massacre of one of our biggest community orchards I've had a lot more critics on my page. I ...
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Plant something mighty!

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 Ancient oak saplings just behind this gate. Pay whatever way you want.  Collect anytime and please close gate behind you.  Next too  47 Lisnabreeny Road East BT6 9SS Fill your boots and get planting something mighty.
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Sad news

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 So guys, I'm 99% sure that no Trust, Conservation group or land owner cut down our orchard. I had a guy from the forest service out to inspect the site and he said it was all done amateur with hand saw and not a professional.   The more I look at it myself you can see what the person/persons has done and why they put everything in the surrounding woods. They've took their time just cutting one tree at a time and disposing of them separately so they would not be seen with a whole pile of trees in case anyone came by.  This has all really knocked me for six to be honest. The thought of someone having this level of revenge and anger towards has been a bit worrying. I'm worried for the rest of the trees.  I will get over it though and with every negative comes an equal or greater positive. This massacre has generated so much publicity and donations that I am going full steam ahead now in the setting up of The Phantom Planters Trust. People all over the country has ...
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Nature does not ask permission

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 Couple of photos from over the years. Ballybeen estate East Belfast with this young girl superstar and Belvoir estate South Belfast. This apple tree never ceases to produce in abundance.  For over 10 years now I've been phantom planting fruit trees around housing estates. Providing free food for the community and connecting people to nature. The majority of the people love this and want to see more of it.  Over 200 apple trees I've had cut down just recently. As most of you know I've been building a free food map. Near 700 trees I had mapped here which I was building into a free food map so everyone can get free fruit. The map has been a rod for my own back. The authorities have used this map to track my trees and cut many of them down.  I will not be updating this map anymore guys unless on land thats not council owned.  It won't be stopping me phantom planting on council land. I just won't be publishing the locations.  Keep an eye out for more environmen...
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St Columba the rascal Saint

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 Last month I went over to Scotland to explore the history of Dalriada - (the ancient Ulster Scots Kingdom) and also to see Fingals Cave which has been on my bucket list for many years now.  At the top of the Dalriada fort it mentions that they had strong links with the St Columba monestary which lay 37 miles to the west of the Dalriada fort.  This was the first time I ever heard St Columba mentioned was at the top of this fort.  After that I had to head to the Isle of Mull to get another boat from there to FIngals cave. On the way back from Fingals Cave we were offered to stop off and see St Columbas monestary on Iona Island.  I got off and had a nosey around. What a place this is! It was there I found out that St Columba came from Ireland to set up this early Celtic/Christian monestary which I believe is one of the longest standing still active monasteries in the world. After that I never gave St Columba a second a thought.  Just a couple of days ago me a...
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The last survivors

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 Got some good coverage about the orchard massacre in both our 2 main newspapers here -   The Belfast Telegraph and the Irish News. Check out their Facebook pages guys to read the stories. For some reason Facebook has now limited how many links you can share overwise I would have put the links up here for you to read. What a weird one.  Thank you Belfast Telegraph and the Irish news for this.  Anyhow guys, these 4 heritage Irish apple trees was all I managed to retrieve from the massacre. Look how they have been ripped apart. Over 100 of these small apple trees we had phantom planted here on open community/common land. This land isn't owned by any individual. The majority of my phantom plantings are on community/common land. If land is overgrown and not being maintained with no boundary markers or fences then there are old laws to say this is common land for the community. These open spaces that are left untouched will naturally rewild themselves anyway.  A...
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Out of a muddy pond blooms a lotus flower

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 Good morning guys,  Just want to thank everyone for the messages of support and for all the donations. Also loving all the pics of people who have went out and planted some trees in memory of the massacre of our community orchard. Also the amount of messages and pics from people saying I've inspired them to become phantom planters over the years is epic. I get a bit emotional reading them sometimes the impact I've had on people.  I would say this movement has inspired at least a million trees to be planted all over the world from I started this Phantom Planter page nearly 7 years ago now.  I have said that this massacre of our second largest community orchard will be the catalyst for something new. It really has got me thinking about a few things and how I'm going to go forward.  The money I have gotten in donations will be going towards setting up The Phantom Planters Trust.  This is something I've been wanting to do for sometime now but just never had th...
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