Help us open to people in need in Norfolk

Hello – We are Ed and Alex, the Directors for Ingleborough Care Farm in West Norfolk and are working very hard towards opening our doors as soon as possible. We are very nearly there but we need your help in the last hurdle so we can open by the end of August 2023.

Ingleborough Care Farm is a not-for-profit organisation. Our mission is to provide high-quality therapeutic farming interventions (Green Care) for people with learning disabilities, autism, mental health disorders and neurological disabilities.

What we are asking for

We are a Community Interest Company (CIC), which means all the profits go straight back into the company once we are up and running (and making profit). We are asking for your help to get this service open for the Norfolk community.  

We are launching this campaign to raise £1600 to help care for the animals and maintain the care farm. This funding supports the farm for 3 months with core costs such as:

• Paying for animal costs such as bedding, food, vet bills
• Covering the rising cost of energy bills,
• Helping to cover the core costs such as insurance whilst the farm does not have an income.

Please note that Alex and Ed do NOT take a wage, they are volunteers and are currently receiving support from other volunteers to prepare the farm to open.

There are several ways you can help in a donation such as a one-off payment, a set contribution and naming an animal, or a regular donation. 

We are asking for your help due to unexpected delays and budget changes caused by problems we have faced. If you are interested, you can follow our social media pages to receive updates and follow our story. 

Here are just some of the ways your money helps:

• £10 buys a week of pig nuts 
• £10 buys a bag of chicken bedding
• £20 buys two weeks of chicken food
• £30 pays for one rabbits vaccinations

What will you get in return?

Every donation is really appreciated, and you are playing a crucial role in helping those in need. Depending on the contribution you have selected, you can name an animal on the farm such as our pig, geese, or chickens! Your chosen name will be printed on the Farm’s plaque by the animal’s home. For ethical purposes the chosen name must be appropriate this is up to the Farm’s discretion. More information on the Farm’s animals and the reasons why they need names are below. 

Our Personal Story

Our son (18) and daughter (14) are our inspiration for the Farm and why we are passionate about helping disabled people as we have been through so much ourselves.  Our son grew up under the care of Great Ormond Street Hospital and The Royal Brompton Hospital in London, having had 15 operations in his lifetime, he also has learning disabilities and autism. Our daughter faces various challenges in mainstream school, being a female living with autism. We live local to the Farm in Norfolk and are medical professionals. Alex is a Nurse, specialising in learning disabilities and autism, and Ed is a paramedic, leaving the NHS to work on the Farm, and learning a huge amount every day about farming. We have been impacted by the lack of provision for people with disabilities from the journey we have been on with our children and decided to do something about it by opening Ingleborough Care Farm to help other families in similar difficulty who want a better quality of life for themselves or loved one(s). 

Alex and Ed do not take a wage from the Farm, they are volunteers, and we have volunteers helping on the farm to keep it ticking over. Ed continues at present to work as a Paramedic pretty much full time on nights, and works on the farm during the day, Alex is dedicated to the farm full time.  

Ingleborough Care Farm

We will be helping people with learning disabilities and autism, mental health and neurological disabilities. Once open it will be a place where people can come and heal, an alternative to day care; a safe space where people are accepted for who they are. For some, it may be the element of being amongst nature, for others it maybe the animals perhaps. It is 'Green Care' therapy from the outside world. We will be offering a range of nature- based activities tailored to the client’s needs. We are non-judgemental and welcoming.

We are not classed as a health provider, but we are a therapeutic farm.  We are not funded by anyone. Our income is from winning a contract with Norfolk County Council (which we worked very hard to achieve) and will also be receiving grants and fundraising. We have been successful with Norfolk County Council to get clients referred through a commissioning system for learning disabilities and autism, this is where Social Services refer via a Social Worker (or associate). Once the Farm is up and running, we will be applying for commissioning for clients with mental health challenges in the same way.  People can be self-referred using their own direct payments if they wish and have an assessment of need. We can soon also do the same process for Lincolnshire and Cambridgeshire clients.

We aim in the future to appeal to grant providers to undertake projects such as an NHS PTSD project – this is where NHS staff would be invited to visit the Farm on an agreed day for therapeutic-based activities. This is due to the rising cause of PTSD in NHS staff is a result of the Coronavirus pandemic. We are also aiming for a similar project for the military. 

In the current food climate, we want to be able to help people with the food we grow to ease the impact from the cost of living crisis. Many people do not have enough food to eat, living in food poverty. This will be discussed in our client’s assessment, and we can ensure extra food we grow is given to those who are in need. We can teach clients simple ways to grow food at home (we can discuss growing needs at home and how it can be adapted), giving them picture cards to take home to help remind them, and we can share ideas about how to re-use old items to grow in and how it can cost minimal amounts. For example, getting seeds from vegetables you have already grown and sourcing and making free compost. The food we grow on the farm will be used to eat with the clients, and food grown can be taken home to their families and carers. Extra food left over can be shared with volunteers to reduce the burden of the cost of food on them too. We are talking to our local food bank to see what they are able to take as this will help them and the local people.  We are growing all sorts of healthy vegetables from kale, Kohl Rabi, to potatoes, cucumbers and courgettes.  We do not want any vegetables to go to waste, as it is so important for the climate and the local people to make sure they are used, if any are unable to be eaten they are composted or go in wormery.

We will teach people to be aware of their environmental impact in green spaces, take care of the farm, cook lunch's and make simple meals with what we have grown, composting skills, employability skills for some, ensuring the wildlife on the farm is thriving, make bird boxes and bug boxes to put around the farm, making spaces to encourage new wildlife, building our sensory garden, creating and caring for meadows, creating sunflower spaces, encourage beetles to the farm for soil health (building beetle banks), restoring wildlife corridors, caring for hedges and trees, care for the animals, growing plants in our changing climate and how we can adapt, this is just a minimal idea of the things we do.

Our Animals so Far

We have 24 chickens, 2 geese, 3 giant rabbits, 2 disabled wild ducks we care for and 1 other duck who is part of their gang, and a KuneKune pig and plan on expanding our therapeutic animals when we are open. We have an equine animal therapist who is working with us and will be helping us to use the animals to their full therapeutic potential.  

Our pig was kindly donated, but nearly every person who has visited has not liked her name 'Crackle', the reaction we get is physical to be honest, with people wincing, so we saw this as a really good opportunity to rename her.  So please give a chicken a funky name, give a goose an identity to last a lifetime, and our very special pig a wonderfully special name as gentle as she is. Your donation will come with a little plaque on the pens. The pictures are of our chickens and pig, they are so friendly. We were so lucky to have the chickens and geese, they are just so adorable.   donated,The chickens are in two pens, in the larger pen are the rescued chickens, mostly from supermarkets where they get culled at 18 months old. They are always so pleased to see us, and just love company. We have two spotty chickens who were also rescued (one giving us wonderful bluey/green eggs), two geese who live with the chickens and keep themselves to themselves, but are really well behaved, a large cockerel called Tank who takes amazing care of his girls, two baby chickens who were born on Easter Sunday and hand reared by us, who still have no names, now at the farm living with Flossie and Flora (who were kindly donated a few weeks ago, and are SO cute, who we are not renaming as their names are so lovely) in a separate pen. The four smaller chickens (and younger) are kept separate as they are so little, Tank may hurt them if he 'sat' on them, so for now they are next door, with Tank looking lovingly through the net!  So please help us in naming the chickens, the babies, the geese, the ducks and the pig.  

Why we are asking

We are launching this campaign to raise £1600 to help care for our animals, maintain our beautiful farm, whilst we work on setting up the last part of the farm for clients. This will support us for three months with our core costs.  We can open at the end of August 2023, but we will not get any money in from the clients attending until mid September, maybe even October at the earliest so we need to financially plan as unexpected delays have caused our budgets to change. Finishing getting the health and safety in place for the farm includes things such as fire extinguishers, a new fire alarm system, PPE for the woodwork area and safety signage for around the farm and pond.  We are working with Kings Lynn Council, Norfolk County Council and Norfolk Fire Service to ensure we are a safe service to open, which is the most important thing.

Support so far

We have had amazing sponsors and grant donations to help us to get where we are so far, which we cannot express enough gratitude for. This has been used for things such as our 1949 Massey Fergusson tractor, chicken coop, polytunnel watering system, variety of gardening hand tools, wheelbarrows, pulley trolleys and disabled access caravan (which will be delivered soon). We have also put in our life savings to set up the care farm, and since taking it over we have faced many challenges which were not expected causing a large financial impact.  

The money will help pay for the running the farm until we open and get the farms income stream up and running, then the farm will be self sufficient. Grants can then be used for projects and to buy things for the farm. The animals will play a vital role for the clients health and wellbeing programmes, for many the farm can be a place to come and be a place of peace and tranquillity. 

We understand in these difficult financial times if you cannot pledge any money, instead you could help us by sharing our Crowdfunding page and telling people our story. If you are interested, please take the time to read a little bit more about us below and what we are trying to achieve at Ingleborough Care Farm.