There are many orchard projects taking place across the UK throughout the year. Stay updated with events happening near you below.
Few British sights are as uplifting or evocative as fruit tree boughs heavy with spring blossom, and nowhere is this more in evidence than in orchards. Partly man-made and partly natural, orchards are a meeting point of both worlds.
The Orchard Network are launching a new annual celebration called Orchard Blossom Day. Sites across the country will host events with activities like tours, produce fairs, picnics and practical crafts.
Follow the links below to the map to find a participating site near you.
An annual celebration of fruit trees, flowers and food. See buzzing pollinators, eat and drink tasty orchard products, and enjoy the fresh spring air.
See the Orchard Blossom Day map
Put your own Orchard Blossom Day venue on the map
Apple Day
In 1990, dismayed by the loss of so many traditional orchards and amazed at the vast range of varieties of apple that have been grown here, Common Ground set out to create a new celebration of our most versatile fruit and the beautiful orchards they come from. It would simply be called ‘Apple Day’.
The first Apple Day was held on October 21 in 1990 in the old Apple Market in Covent Garden, London, bringing fruit back there for the first time in 17 years. It struck a chord. Since then, Common Ground have worked to extend, support and promote Apple Day countrywide through nurseries, fruit farms, restaurants, National Trust and RHS gardens, museum, art centres, community groups and schools who celebrate the day in their own place, in their own way.
Apple Day celebrates everything to do with orchards, from fruit variety identification to apple and cider tasting, and bring-your-own juicing services.
Find an Apple Day near you
“Apple Day is not a marketing device, its creation has been impelled by altruism and idealism for living better with nature – the apple and the orchard are symbols of hope. They demonstrate how we can have our trees, bees, bats, butterflies, birds and badgers whilst growing good fruit to eat and drink” (Sue Clifford).
Crab Apple Project
Starting in 2022 and continuing for three seasons, the Orchard Network and People's Trust for Endangered Species is coordinating a research project to identify the true identity of the native crab apple Malus sylvestris.
Since the time of the Roman occupation, various genetic material from other species of apple, overwhelmingly the common eating apple Malus domestica, has been cross-pollinating with sylvestris to varying amounts. This project aims to use DNA to map hybridisation dispersal and ultimately establish if the original species still exists, and how to identify it in the field.
This project has been funded by the City Bridge Trust.
In a joint project with People's Trust for Endangered Species, the Orchard Network are aiming to identify the true identity of the native crab apple, Malus sylvestris.
