The 3rd Donegal Raphoe Cub Scouts spent an evening farming at Ballyholey Farm with Donegal Daily’s resident Horticulturist Gareth Austin and farm owner John Graham.
This visit was about connecting the children to how food is produced, both from a vegetable and a meat perspective.
During the trip the kids sowed some beans and peas into ridges in the fields, tasted and harvested fresh herbs in the polytunnel, foraged for some wild leaves in the hedgerows, changed bedding in the hen house, bottle fed some pet lambs and fed some cattle wonky vegetables.
Damien Doherty, Cub Scouts Section Leader, “The kids really enjoyed the visit, many don’t come from farming families so for these kids it was informative for them to see the journey that food takes before it reaches them”.
The Donegal Food Coast Initiative, a project delivered by the Donegal Local Enterprise Office, highlighted this event as a wonderful event connecting kids to ‘life on the farm’.
“We can’t wait to see them back in a few months, where hopefully they will help us perform some harvesting and let me know how they got on with the seeds they took home” Added John Graham from Ballyholey Farm.
Raphoe Scouts are the oldest Scout Troop in Donegal, having been formed in 1920 and can be contacted via their FB page ‘3rd Donegal (Raphoe) Scout Group’
At the end of the session there were plenty of dirty welly boots and smiling faces!
