Summer 2025: 5 – 6 Month Kitchen Garden Trainee Volunteer Role

Would you like to develop your skills as a market gardener?
Deepen your food-growing, people and organisational skills?
Learn about the wildlife that supports our crops, bringing balance to a
healthy soil and creating a thriving local ecosystem?

Read on:

About Us
Here in Asthall Manor Kitchen Garden we are growing healthy, wildlife-friendly and people-friendly food using organic methods and permaculture principles. We grow a wide variety of salad leaves, annual and perennial vegetables and a variety of fruits for a fledgling but growing mini-box scheme (Crop Share), for the village pub, for local chefs and for the Manor kitchen. We do this while encouraging community engagement with the site and promoting biodiversity by providing as much wild habitat as possible – such as ponds, log piles, flowering wildflowers (weeds), seed heads, perennial strips, tree alleys and uncut margins for beneficial creatures to feed, hunt, sleep, bask, breed and hibernate in.

Under the umbrella of Asthall Wild CIC (Community Interest Company), the Kitchen Garden is being developed and overseen by Lead Grower Tim Mitchell, a City & Guilds Level 2 qualified Organic food grower with 9 years of experience. He is also qualified to teach in the adult learning sector and has previously taught both Level 1 and Level 2 food growing at Organiclea, a 12-acre community and production Organic certified market garden designed and operated along permaculture, consensus and cooperative principles. Tim is assisted by Fiona, our assistant part-time grower.

The traineeship
Under the guidance of Tim, Fiona and the Landworkers Alliance Trainee curriculum (updated and adapted for our site) you will learn the skills required to manage the food production at Asthall Manor, to integrate that with the needs of volunteers, and to take on selected responsibilities for propagating, maintaining and harvesting crops over the growing season.

Here are some words from our 2024 trainee:

“Being at Asthall Manor Kitchen Garden has provided me with a wealth of experiences, great connections and wonderful memories and I would highly recommend getting involved with this magical place.”

The site
Your work will be based in the 1 acre kitchen garden containing approx. 600m2 of vegetable beds, 65m2 of which is undercover, 40+ fruit trees of both standard and trained forms, mixed soft fruit bushes, wildlife areas, perennial alleys and beds, rainwater capture and mains irrigation, a compost toilet, a barn containing a potting bay, tools and materials and a serviced outbuilding for breaks, lunches, harvest processing and washing up.

Details of the role

This is a voluntary unpaid role (but see below).
Minimum age for applications: 18 years old.
Time commitment: 32 hours per week with flex, to be arranged and agreed in
advance, as far as possible.
Some weekend commitments as part of the flexible days (see the ‘Weekend
work’ section below for more details).
Dates: Option of 5 or 6 months, from the beginning (or end) of April to the
beginning (or end) of September 2025, to be discussed during interview.

Supported by

Free accommodation in the Manor house (vegetarian household).
£75 per week stipend
£100 of store cupboard dry goods / essentials bought at beginning of season.
A weekly Crop Share from the Kitchen Garden.
Weekly 1.5hr horticultural learning check-ins with Tim.
The structure of our adapted version of the Landworkers Alliance Traineeship
Curriculum, along with Tim’s teaching resources.
Free place on kitchen garden workshops, if not sold out.
A provided, shared lunch with Tim and / or Assistant Grower Fiona and
volunteers on volunteer days.
Next steps career guidance, contacts and signposting, subject to completing the
Traineeship Curriculum to a satisfactory level.

To apply: Please send a CV or a description of your employment (and volunteering) history and a covering letter detailing your reasons for applying and what qualities you will bring to the team, to [email protected]. For any questions or more information about this role, please contact Tim at the email address above.

Deadline for applications: 8am Monday 3 rd March 2025.
Interviews: Week commencing 10 th March 2025.

Main objectives of the traineeship

To learn about and assist with all aspects of propagation for glasshouse, polytunnels and outdoor beds.
To learn about and assist with all aspects of maintaining the vegetable growing and surrounding areas within the kitchen garden.
To assist with harvesting and preparing produce for the Crop Share and other outlets.
To support the above practical learning with successful completion of weekly 1.5hr tutorials, using our adapted Landworkers Alliance Traineeship Curriculum as a structure, along with Tim’s teaching resources.
To provide support for volunteers and other visitors on site.

Main Activities
Growing

Preparing propagation media.
Raising plants from seed.
Irrigation.
Planting and maintaining covered crops, field vegetables, salad leaves, green manures and companion plants.
Organic weed, pest and disease management.
Managing perennial vegetables, soft fruit bushes and tree crops.

Harvesting

Cutting/picking produce to the agreed methods and quantities, ensuring quality control.
Weighing, packaging, sealing, labelling and organising dispatch of produce.
Working with volunteers.
Work to ensure all volunteers on site are safe, welcomed, valued and supported.
Work to ensure all other visitors on site are safe, welcomed, valued and supported.
Lead tasks with volunteers.

Weekend work

Be available to be on-site two weekends per month for minimal caretaking duties (opening / closing tunnels, watering) and / or to support growers during workshops and open days, during the traineeship.
Dates for the above will be agreed at the beginning of the traineeship, as far as possible.

Person Specification
Essential

Interest in sustainable food production and the desire to put that interest into practice.
Enthusiasm and willingness to learn as part of a practical, hard-working team.
Some experience of growing food.
Ability to supervise and explain tasks to other volunteers.
Ability to work outdoors in all weather.
Ability to carry out shared tasks and work within a team.
Ability to work on own initiative, self-manage, work alone on occasions, prioritise tasks and work to deadlines.
Commitment to dedicating an additional estimated 1 day per week (or equivalent) for self-led research, reading and note-taking, to make the most of the weekly tutorials and Trainee Curriculum.
Commitment to and understanding of the Aims of Asthall Wild CIC
Compassion for the diverse needs of people, other animals and plants.

Desirable

Level 1 or Level 2 Organic food growing qualification.
Experience of working with volunteers in Organic food prodcution.
Good weed identification skills.

We welcome applications from candidates with diverse backgrounds.

And you don’t have to come alone…….
If you have a partner or friend you are prepared to share a double or twin bedroom with, and who:

1. Would also like to do the traineeship or

2. Has maintenance, administrative, cooking, events management or any other
skills that would be useful at this busy Manor house with lots going on, and would like some paid work, during the traineeship period…

…then we would like to hear from you about this. Please add their bio and CV to
your application.