Here at Building Futures East we are committed to supporting the communities local to us through the creation of training and job opportunities as well as through supporting local businesses and residents to create pleasant and sustainable outdoor areas.

As part of this pledge, the training and office staff at Building Futures East teamed up with the gardening staff back in Spring this year to learn all about how to plant and grow your own potatoes!

The BFE Potato Growing Challenge…

Through careful nurturing over the spring and early summer, the teams of 2, made up of one gardening team member and one training/office team member watched as their potato plants started to pop through the soil and flower.  Today the potatoes were ready to dig up and the staff were more than pleased with their bounty!

Our ‘less-experienced-at-growing’ staff were provided with hints and tips along the way to help to ensure today’s bumper crops!

The winners were certainly pleased with the results!!!

Dennis Baldwin and Steven Mills won the Strangest-Shaped Potato competition with their figure-of-8-shaped tattie! Dennis believes this could have been thanks to “inconsistent watering!!”

Dennis Baldwin gets ready to see what he's grown

Dennis and Dave search for potatoes

Fiona Hall and Chris Blaney won ‘Biggest Potato’.  Fiona said “it has spurred me on to want to grow things at home as it was good fun and wasn’t as messy as I thought it would be!”  “Now that we know what to do, I would really like to grow some beetroot, potatoes and carrots in my own garden to see what I can achieve.”

Fiona has found a winner!

Winners of the biggest crop Mel Wellden and Steven Holmewood commented that they think their crop won as they watered them twice a week, taking careful care of them.

Mel and Steven show off their winning crop!

All the other competitors really enjoyed the experience too…

Hazel Saint said of the competition that “it was a wonderful experience to bond with other members of the team that we don’t always see often as they are out and about gardening all day…… I really enjoyed it even though I had the worst “Tatey-Turnout!”

Tracey Johnson commented that “this experience has spurred me on to apply for my own allotment and I am looking forward to the next growing challenge.”

The office and training team would like to say a big thank you to the gardening team for showing them how easy it is to grow your own vegetables.  We can’t wait for the next growing challenge!!!

David Vasey empties out his potatoes

Caroline picks out a few good potatoes

Mel checks the soil for her prize potatoes

Tracy finds some good potatoes amongst the soil

Staff show off their potato crops