FREE for members / £2 non-members on the door

Whet your appetite for potato day with a chat about all things spuds. Join Rachel Palfreyman (who has ordered the varieties for Potato Day for about 15 years) and Graeme Green (potato grower and chip enthusiast). Please join us to hear all about the previous season of potato growing, hear about their favourites and what’s available to buy at this year’s Potato Day on Jan 31st. Tell us about your favourites too!

FREE for members / £2 non-members on the door

No speaker this month, but join us for a social evening.
Bring food and drink to share if you wish.

You can buy your 2026 membership at this meeting.

A talk by Dr Linda Birkin.

Introducing spiders, their biology and ecology. What they are, what they do, how to manage habitat for spiders, fun spider facts- everything you need to know!

Entry - £2 guests / free for members

Bethan will talk about her 3 month trip to USA exploring local food growing systems.

”Last year I travelled the USA learning about Urban Farms and Gardens and how they shape communities. I saw vertical farms in shipping containers in Boston, city composting and an urban teaching farm in New York, community gardens in Philadelphia rooted in the Puerto Rican history, university campus farms run by students and the most incredible food event celebrating Radicchio in Portland.

I can't wait to give you a whistle stop tour of inspiration and hope through gardens and inspiring stories so we can work together to make our city more green and resilient for the future! Invite your pals who love gardens!”

Entry - £2 guests / free for members

7.15pm for a 7.30pm start

There will be a review of the year, voting of the committee for 2025/2026 and an opportunity to hear from you about what you would like NOGs to offer in the coming year. We will have an external facilitator to run a session after the AGM to help us explore what NOGs should look like in the coming months and years. We would really welcome your presence and energy in helping us take NOGs forward into 2026.

The role of Chair, Treasurer and Secretary are to be voted for at the AGM.

If anyone would like to find out more about the committee or the roles, please contact chair, Andy Callow contact@nogs.info

New Committee Members welcome!!!

We really would welcome new people to the committee and you would be made welcome and supported. We are also interested in people who perhaps want to join the committee for specific tasks - potato day or the allotment for example. It's your NOGs and the more people can be involved in the sharping and tuning of it the more meaningful it is. We are a friendly group and its good fun!

Get in touch before the meeting - contact@nogs.info

NOGS AGM report - download pdf to read

Free Admission

Plant Swap!

FREE admission

Bring your spare seedlings, plants and seed packets and swap them for something new! If you've not got anything spare you can still join in, just give a donation instead.

SWIFT STREET – WILD.NG
FREE for members / £2 non-members on the door

Trish Evans & Nick Humphreys of wildlife group WildNG will talk about Swifts. These fascinating birds have really gripped the imagination of many people in the city who are providing habitats for them by putting up swift boxes.

Learn all about the amazing life cycle of these birds and how people will be celebrating their arrival this Spring.

Read more about Swift Street here:
https://www.wild-ng.uk/swifts

One Garden Against the World: In Search of Hope in a Changing Climate

1.15pm doors open
2.00pm Start of talk

Tickets £12 / £9
CLICK HERE TO BUY TICKETS

KATE BRADBURY is an award-winning writer specialising in wildlife gardening and the author of The Bumblebee Flies Anyway. She's the Wildlife Editor of BBC Gardeners' World Magazine and has a regular Country Diary column in The Guardian. She writes regularly for the RHS The Garden magazine, The Wildlife Trusts members' magazine and BBC Wildlife. Her garden was featured as part of the BBC Springwatch Garden Watch campaign, and she and her garden have also appeared on Autumnwatch and Gardeners' World. Kate lives in Brighton with her partner, Emma, and their rescue dog, Tosca.

Information and stalls (to be confirmed):
Five Leaves Bookshop
Nottingham City Council Carbon Zero 2028
Nottingham Organic Gardeners annual programme and allotment
WLT
Bethan's seeds and produce stall
NCN sustainability team

No Mow May
FREE for members / £2 non-members on the door

Ellie Mitchell, professional wildlife gardener and podcast host tells us why No Mow May is so good for wildlife in our gardens. This idea  has really taken off and  many people now choose to leave their lawns un-mown for the month of May and beyond, to support wildlife.

Garden Bugs

FREE for members / £2 non-members on the door

Join us as Entomologist Dr Linda Birkin talks about all the wonderful wild critters sharing our green spaces. Linda will give us an overview of the different types of invertebrates you’re likely to encounter, what they’re all up to and how they help or hinder us.

Join us at the URC in Sherwood to browse 30+ varieties of seed potato as well as onions, shallots and garlic. Cakes stalls and refreshment available.

The place to buy your potatoes for growing in the midlands!

VARIETIES
We have endeavoured to provide a good range of varieties of seed potato including unusual and organic varieties.
Download 2025 Variety List here

This year’s prices are 5 tubers for £1
You can pay by cash or card

Also you can read more information about the event here.

ADDITIONAL PRODUCTS
We will be selling onion sets, shallots and possibly garlic too.

STALLS AND TALKS
We will have a range of pop up stalls and also some talks throughout the day.
Thomas Etty seeds stall in the main hall and more stalls can be found after the payment desks, next to the cafe and include:

• Local Honey for sale

• Nottingham Wildlife Trust

• Greenwood Nursery

• Nottingham Climate Assembly

• Foraging and mushrooms

• Bethan’s plants and produce

• Nottingham Growing Network

• … and The Potato Games with Ellie

CAKE!
There will also be tea and cake from our pop up cafe so you can sit down and chat more about spuds.

VENUE / TRANSPORT INFORMATION
Venue: United Reformed Church, 1 Edwards Lane, Sherwood NG5 3AA (Behind the Sherwood Manor Pub)
Buses 56, 57, 58, 59, 87, 88, 89 from Parliament Street to “Sherwood Shops”.
Blue Badge parking only at the venue – plus local free car parks.
 

TIME SLOT SUGGESTIONS
10am - 12pm: ideal for those who know what they want and for those who want particular varieties from the list. When finalised the list will be posted on our website and shared through Facebook
12pm - 3pm: ideal for those who would like more time and advice.

Potato Day Preview

FREE for members / £2 non-members on the door

Whet your appetite for potato day with a chat about all things spuds. Rachel Palfreyman has ordered  the varieties for Potato Day for about 15 years. Please join us to talk about your favourites, her favourites and what’s available this year.

We did some  mini- not v scientific-  trials of various varieties on the NOGs allotment & well have the results of those too.

Winter Social

FREE for members / £2 non-members on the door

No speaker this month, but join us for a social evening.
Bring food and drink to share if you wish.

You can buy your 2025 membership at this meeting.

New and experienced Gardeners are welcome to join our Sow and Grow sessions held by Nottingham Organic Gardeners on our well established organic allotment site at Whitemoor Allotments. The sessions are open to new volunteers on a monthly basis. If you want to come more often please let us know!

What do we do?

We meet on the plot for a start time of 11am prompt, tours of the garden are given to new visitors and hot and cold drinks available. Each month we will focus on the seasons and sow seeds, care for plants and make compost. The joy of our gardening sessions is that we share in the work, share in the harvests and share plants.

Each month we will sow a collection of seeds appropriate for the time of year. Some will be for the garden but some will be for you to take home. If you have your own pots please bring some along but we do have spare!

Once we have finished sowing seeds we will share Gardening tasks are given out and you can be paired with a NOGs member to learn what to do so don't worry if you are still learning - so are we!

After a morning of gardening activities we stop for light lunch at 1pm - this is normally a vegan soup plus extras.

We try to share as many things as we can in the garden from that day - pick your salad leaves, take spare plants or seedlings home, take a few pots for seedlings etc!

Building Show Gardens

FREE for members / £2 non-members on the door

Join us to hear first hand what it's like producing a garden for a big event. Several of our members have been involved in projects for big show gardens including RHS Chelsea.

They’ll talk about the whole process, from planning to taking it all down.

New and experienced Gardeners are welcome to join our Sow and Grow sessions held by Nottingham Organic Gardeners on our well established organic allotment site at Whitemoor Allotments. The sessions are open to new volunteers on a monthly basis. If you want to come more often please let us know!

What do we do?

We meet on the plot for a start time of 11am prompt, tours of the garden are given to new visitors and hot and cold drinks available. Each month we will focus on the seasons and sow seeds, care for plants and make compost. The joy of our gardening sessions is that we share in the work, share in the harvests and share plants.

Each month we will sow a collection of seeds appropriate for the time of year. Some will be for the garden but some will be for you to take home. If you have your own pots please bring some along but we do have spare!

Once we have finished sowing seeds we will share Gardening tasks are given out and you can be paired with a NOGs member to learn what to do so don't worry if you are still learning - so are we!

After a morning of gardening activities we stop for light lunch at 1pm - this is normally a vegan soup plus extras.

We try to share as many things as we can in the garden from that day - pick your salad leaves, take spare plants or seedlings home, take a few pots for seedlings etc!

Wonderful world of weeds

FREE for members / £2 non-members on the door

The wonderful world of weeds – why are they so successful? How are weeds useful to the gardener? How do we manage weed control organically without herbicides?

Sally Smith is a  professional gardener & previously Head of Information in the Advisory Department at Garden Organic. 

New and experienced Gardeners are welcome to join our Sow and Grow sessions held by Nottingham Organic Gardeners on our well established organic allotment site at Whitemoor Allotments. The sessions are open to new volunteers on a monthly basis. If you want to come more often please let us know!

What do we do?

We meet on the plot for a start time of 11am prompt, tours of the garden are given to new visitors and hot and cold drinks available. Each month we will focus on the seasons and sow seeds, care for plants and make compost. The joy of our gardening sessions is that we share in the work, share in the harvests and share plants.

Each month we will sow a collection of seeds appropriate for the time of year. Some will be for the garden but some will be for you to take home. If you have your own pots please bring some along but we do have spare!

Once we have finished sowing seeds we will share Gardening tasks are given out and you can be paired with a NOGs member to learn what to do so don't worry if you are still learning - so are we!

After a morning of gardening activities we stop for light lunch at 1pm - this is normally a vegan soup plus extras.

We try to share as many things as we can in the garden from that day - pick your salad leaves, take spare plants or seedlings home, take a few pots for seedlings etc!