I had my first look at potential sites for Wild Frontier this week - one was planned while the other was very unexpected!

First was a golf course less than 10 minutes drive from home.  I'd emailed several local golf courses and the local council estates dept during the previous week, and got an immediate keen response from Hilton Park saying there are several potential areas on the land owned by the golf course.  So I arranged a time to go and look, and the greenkeeper took me out for a recce on a golf buggy to see the most suitable spots.

I saw two areas which look like they might work well - one for the early stage of WF and the other for the long term.

    



I found out about the second place by chance.  I'd been picking up a hay bale for the rabbis near Blair Drummond, and drove home past Oakwood Garden Centre near Killearn.  There are some big polytunnels on their site, and I was wondering if there was land there that I could get to use.  As soon as I went in to the garden centre area where the outdoor plants are, a woman assistant asked if she could help me so I said yes, I hope you can.  I just said that I want to run a flower farm and I'm looking for a suitable space.  She said there was a girl who used to work in the garden centre and she and a friend had a polytunnel to grow plants just a few minutes away behind an old disused petrol station.  So I parked in the forecourt of the old petrol station, checked maps and looking on terrain I could make out the skeleton structure of the polytunnel, then drove round to the next junction, parked and walked along a wee section of the West Highland Way and there it was behind a hedge!!  The polythene is all gone (or maybe rolled up on the ground at the base of the structure, but it's definitely got the potential to be fairly easily brought back to being a functioning place.



Above is the terrain map of the old polytunnel and below is the garage as it is now, and a much older photo,



So now I've started trying to get in touch with the owners of the land to see about the possibility of getting to use it.  It was a guy who ran a garage who passed away and has left the land to his family.  They're renting out the houses next to the garage so I've contacted the letting agent who was a bit of a gatekeeper and I could tell he didn't understand what I was trying to communicate to him so I doubt he'll pass on the message to them.




Even if I don't get to use this one, I've had the chance to see what it can be like - the size of the polytunnel, the immediate surrounding area and the land beyond my patch.  I got an AI image of how I imagine this to be:








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