Open Call for Two New GROW Places — Now Accepting Applications!
The GROW Observatory is running citizen science soil sensing activities in the following GROW Places: Austria, Greece, Hungary, Ireland, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Portugal, Scotland and Spain.
Participants are already placing thousands of soil sensors in the ground all over Europe to increase their understanding of their growing sites and to contribute to climate and space science.
You can find more details about their location and how to join at this link:
GROW is currently looking for two new GROW Places in Europe interested in joining these soil sensing activities. The Observatory is inviting applications from networks (growers’ networks, fablabs, transition towns, community and university food growing groups, etc.) wishing to join the GROW Places network.
The GROW Observatory is looking for participants able to install at least 384 sensors in their location, either in their own land, or through a coordinated group of participants in their local area.
What do you need?
- Land to place sensors. Each sensor should be in an area with about 30m of the same kind of environment/land cover (e.g. a pasture, a vegetable garden, woodland). They need to be directly in the ground (not in raised beds) and not in a greenhouse or polytunnel. Sensors need to be placed at least 20m apart so a hectare of suitable land could have up to 25 sensors.
- An Android or iOS device and Bluetooth to retrieve data from the sensors.
- Time and willingness to place the sensors, fill in a short site survey, and to visit them every 2 weeks or so to collect and upload the data.
What do you get?
- Training materials and joining GROW’s Community Champions network
- Free sensors, yours to keep after the project ends on 31st October 2019. Each sensor is worth about £50!
- Support with the interpretation and use of your data to improve your knowledge of your site and, hopefully, to help informed decision-making around soil moisture.
- Support in raising your/ your project profile online and helping more people to connect and learn with you/your project.
- Scope for soil and regenerative food growing workshops and events at your site.
- Some financial support will be available for the Community Champion coordinating the GROW Place as well as expenses to cover events and other eligible costs
If you are interested and meet the above requirements, please complete this online form by 8th April 2019 to tell us more about your location. Please feel free to contact us by email, should you need any further information regarding your application to host a GROW Place in your area, at these email addresses: community@growobservatory.org and hello@growobservatory.org
We look forward to your submissions. In the meantime you can read about all the other ways to get involved with GROW activities here:
More on GROW Places
GROW Place Portugal were busy for World Soil Day:
GROW Place Austria got help from Hungary to dig a very deep and interesting hole…..
GROW Place Ireland have been very active since this was written:
