Hannah scares off the birds

NO scavenging bird should dare to swoop on young Hannah Casey’s vegetable garden. If they do, they’re in for an awful fright.
The Fanore schoolgirl has designed a national award-winning scarecrow to protect any vegetable plot from being raided by birds.
GIY (Grow it Yourself) Ireland had a huge response to its Design a Scarecrow Challenge, which the organisation ran with national schools around Ireland in association with Agriaware, in the run-up to the Bloom 2010 festival in the Phoenix Park, which attracted more than 60,000 people over the June Bank Holiday weekend.
The winner of the challenge was Hannah Casey from Fanore National School with her entry, Hungry Owl. She was featured on the Six One news on RTÉ receiving her prize.
The idea for the challenge was for children to design a scarecrow for the GIY Edible Garden at Bloom to keep birds away from the precious veggies. Feedback from teachers on the educational value of the challenge was excellent and the project helped GIY Ireland to reach out to the “GIYers” of the future.
The North Clare girl particularly impressed the judges and the visitors to Bloom 2010 by producing an entry that was both scary and arty at the same time. Hannah received her prize (a voucher for Woodies DIY and family tickets to Bloom) from Bord Bia CEO Aidan Cotter in the GIY Edible Garden during Bloom.
For her school, Hannah also won a raised bed courtesy of Quickcrop, which will be installed in the school vegetable patch shortly. The runners-up were Aislinn Cullen (Scoil Thomais, Dublin 15) with her entry, Jasper Carrot and Anna Molly and Asia Cheung (also from Scoil Thomais, Dublin 15) with their entry Scary Mary. Photographs of all the entries can be viewed on the GIY Ireland website.
GIY groups from around Ireland grew vegetable plants for the GIY Edible Garden, which was designed to show people that they can have a productive vegetable garden in a small space and that an edible garden can also be incredibly beautiful.
The GIY Edible Garden was constructed and planted by over 50 GIY volunteers over three weekends in May and won a much-coveted silver medal amidst tough competition from professional designers and landscapers.
GIY Ireland’s Michael Kelly said the organisation is incredibly proud of its achievement.
“We got involved with Bloom primarily to spread the word about GIYing and the medal is just such a bonus for us. We’re so proud of our growers and our volunteers who put in a huge effort to make this garden happen. The reason the GIY Edible Garden was the talk of the show was because of their endless enthusiasm and good humour,” he said.
GIY Ireland is a national not-for-profit organisation and registered charity, which aims to inspire people from all walks of life and of all ages to grow their own food and provide them with the practical skills they need to do so successfully.
The organisation takes the ‘self’ out of ‘self-sufficiency’ by getting amateur growers together so that they can learn skills from each other and connect with like-minded individuals. There are now over 70 GIY groups around Ireland and approximately 6,000 people involved between the community groups and the online network, www.giyireland.com.