National Trust aims to make orchard festival a blossoming success

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Japanese cherry blossom. Photograph: Dan Chung

In Japan, tracking the cherry blossom is a national obsession, while in the US pilgrims hunt for the brightest shows of autumnal colours.
Today the National Trust is revealing the British version: a festival to celebrate fruit tree blossom as it sweeps across the country.
Springtime may still feel a long way off, but the Trust is hoping to cheer people up with its Full Bloom project. Nature lovers will be encouraged to visit orchards as they come into bloom and send in images of what they find.
The festival will start in Cornwall's Tamar Valley, home of the Trust's mother orchard, in April. Planted in 2007, the mother orchard consists of 270 trees with 120 varieties typical to Cornwall and Devon, growing on an eight-acre plot. The idea is to grow these trees to adulthood to make sure they are not lost, and then create more trees from them and reintroduce the rare ones to orchards and gardens.
Some of the varieties here were down to their last few trees; others with glorious names like the Pig's Snout were thought to be extinct but were found hiding away in the corner of kitchen gardens.
The focus of the festival will shift northwards, ending in May at Acorn Bank in Cumbria, which has a formal orchard within a walled garden and a large perry pear orchard.
As well as Cotehele and Acorn Bank, the Trust has spectacular orchards as far afield as Somerset, Kent and the Midlands but it is also involving groups such as the Common Ground campaigners, which has long fought for the future of orchards, and the increasing number of groups who are creating new community orchards.
Conservationists hope the blossom festival will also raise attention to the dire plight of the orchard in some regions. Last harvest-time environmental experts and campaigners warned traditional orchards could vanish from the British landscape by the end of the century unless action is taken to save them.
Natural England and the National Trust claimed 60% of England's orchards had disappeared since the 1950s, as they launched a £500,000 project aimed at halting the decline. The crisis has been even worse in some areas, such as Devon, which has lost almost 90% of its orchards.
In Japan the progress of the cherry blossom makes nightly television news. Merry knows the Trust's answer is unlikely to attract such attention, but "with all this wintery weather around, it's something to look forward to", she said.

Grow New Buds

Did you ever notice that most women have friends, but few of us have been educated on how to grow and cultivate friendships that nourish, grow deeper over time and ultimately give more than they take? Even if we have friends we’ve known for years, or we have a lot of friends in number, most women lack – and crave – deeper soul sister connections. In my work with women around the world as a coach and relationship expert, I hear again and again how lonely women are for meaningful, truly supportive friendships, or how often they hang onto the wrong friendships, just like staying in the wrong romantic relationship, and so there is no space for new buds to come in.
The truth is that just like things in nature, like flowers and plants, there is a season for everything. Annuals come back year after year, while some only bloom once. And we are okay with that, because we know if we plant new buds in the ground, new flowers bloom. We could learn a lot about friendship from flowers. Every friendship has a season, some a lifetime, others years and some just a few months — and when we let one friendship go, another will bloom in its place. Some flowers go together better than others, just like people, and the best flower arrangements come from intention and creativity. Flowers do better when loved and cared for, and when they are planted or presented in bunches, or grow together in fields or gardens. 
If you were to take a look around your ‘friendship garden’ where do you lack the friendships you desire – is it deep ‘soul sisters’ you can share your heart with, more ‘good time girls’ who you can just hang out and have a good time, or women who share a common interest, passion or situation with you?
Use the five tips below to grow yourself a garden full of buds and blooms you love, and that love you back.

1. Grow little buds into blooming buds.It’s easier to grow friendships with people you already know than to start fresh. Choose friends past or present who have the potential to grow deeper and stronger, and to make your life better. Put energy here. Be proactive at reaching out. If they live farther away, send them surprise flowers just because you are grateful to have them in your life. Think of it as helping your friendship bloom as a flower blooms—steadily and beautifully.
2. Be honest about who you want in your friend bouquet. Be intentional with whom you want to surround yourself. Make a list of these buds (call it your friendship manifesto)—who they are, what they like to do, and how you feel when you are around them. Place the manifesto somewhere sacred (perhaps under a flowering plant to signify blooming friendships) and every so often take it out and read it, and keep your eyes out for new friends!
3. Be inspired by others, not envious. If sunflowers spent all their time trying to be roses, they would be very unhappy sunflowers. Next time you find yourself comparing yourself to someone else, find what inspires you about that person, and tell them so! Watch how their heart opens because you’ve showered them with appreciation instead of judgment or envy, and you might just find a new friend.
4. Look for new buds that feel like you. There is a universal relationship law that says like attracts like, which means people are attracted to energy on the outside that matches the energy on the inside. So if you want new friends that you resonate with and that feel good to be around, put your true self out to the world so others can see you. Think about what qualities you have to share with others and embrace this as part of your essence, so that your new buds will have an easier time finding you, and you them.
5. Plant seeds in new fields. Put yourself out there to new people in new circles instead of just hanging out with the same people. If your new friends were flowers, what kind would they be? Do you want to grow fun friendships (think daisies or tulips), sophisticated ones (think lilies or orchids), or calming ones (think bamboo plants or succulents)? Surround yourself with these kinds of flowers or plants in your home to remind yourself of the new friends you are welcoming into your heart and life.