News

The possibility of the parish having a small scale solar farm that would create enough power for around 400 homes and bring in annual revenue was discussed at an open meeting on Tuesday 11th October.

Nick Oldridge, our Parish councillor who heads up Sustainable Littlehempton, gave a power point presentation to a well attended meeting. He explained that this opportunity comes from a new campaign called Power Allotments Devon, who have identified our parish as one of the most suited to this project. There was a positive reaction to the proposals and agreement that this project was worth pursuing. The next step is to locate a site of around 5 to 7 acres. The best sites tend to be tucked away and shielded from homes, either by trees, hedgerows or hills, and reasonably accessible by road and close to a local grid connection, possibly poorer quality agricultural fields that could be managed for biodiversity such as introducing a pond, orchard or a beehive. Here is some more information on finding a site.

If you think you have a suitable out of the way field of five or more acres, please contact Nick Oldridge.

Note: Power Allotments Devon is a project set up by Devon Energy Collective CIC, a not-for-profit community interest company, whose purpose is to develop community owned renewables projects across Devon to address climate change.

The sun shone all day on Littlehempston Community Orchard’s first apple pressing day. Organised by Jim Price and Tim Graves, it was a lovely community event with the children having great fun trying to knock apples from the very well laden trees. The BBQ food was delicious (thank you, Naomi, Jess and Deb) and the apple juice flowed all afternoon, so there was no shortage of liquid for the thirsty workers. Half way through, Littlehempston Folk entertained with a medley of songs that could be heard from the Tally Ho garden over the meadow.

The system was very slick. A tractor and trailer had brought a manual rack and cloth press, together with a generator to run the free-standing electric scratter. First the apples were poured into the scratter and out the other end came the “scrat” or pulp. The “scrat” was then shovelled on to a cloth-lined frame in the press – young Ethan became very good at this. After lots of frames had been stacked, the pressure plate was put on top and a bar inserted. Then came the hard work of pushing the bar around the press to squeeze the fruit pulp – young Niamh provided lots of muscle power as did Hamish. And from the press gushed gallons of delicious juice that was bottled and enjoyed by all.

All agreed it was a fine occasion and definitely one for the Littlehempston annual calendar. Deb Price said Thank you all so much, it was a really lovely day. Such warm company, in such a special place, the trees beautifully bursting with colour. The apple juice is now resting in demijohns awaiting the alchemy of fermenting! Hopefully the liquid cider gold will be ready for wassailing! Roll on January!

Many thanks to all who helped organise this great event.