Rock Farm Community Food Forest

Food forests are 'somewhere between an allotment and an orchard' – a way for people to access organic and sustainably farmed food. This is one of the Food Forest Project's more unusual projects in Shepton Mallet. In March 2019, the Food Forest Project planted the first three layers of a community food forest at Rock Farm, in Shepton. However, the conflict with the local sheep residing within the food forest meant that we needed to diversify, so we’ve left the food forest as a diverse orchard space, and decided to build a small market garden, farmed regeneratively by volunteers using no-till methods, to grow organic produce, free for the local food bank. It’s our first season doing so this year, and we’ve already had a hugely positive response from people in the town. We hope to eventually expand these operations to grow produce for other food banks in Somerset!