July on the Farm

Welcome to this months edition of our newsletter. As always we have lots to tell you about! Much of this months activity has been on the farm. Despite the unpredictable weather we managed to get all our silage cut towards the end of June. The recent wet and warm weather has provided us with a bumper crop - almost twice as much as last year's that will keep our cattle fed when the weather turns and the grass stops growing later in the year. We will hope to be cutting again later in the summer when the grass has had time to grow again, as always we are dependant on mother nature for that though!

This week we have welcomed to the farm nine healthy Gloucesteshire Old Spot piglets that were born on Monday night. Over the next few weeks, you will see them playing about in the mud with their proud mum next to our allotments. All our Gloucesteshire Old Spot mum's are expecting so there will be plenty of little oinks larking about soon enough!

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Kate has been trying to look on the bright side this month and ignore the rain, cold, wind and slugs. So in positive news: the yummy tender early broad beans are now available in the shop, along with her favourite lettuce variety: Marvel of 4 Seasons, a beautiful red crinkly butterhead. Plus the spring onions are now ready, and tomato plants are looking good in the tunnel - just need some more sun. The leeks been transplanted from the poly-tunnel and are now happily settling into their rows in the.field. Fingers crossed that July will be warm and sunny...

We have also had an update from Robert, our beekeeper extraordinaire. Last year our bees didn't enjoy the climate and so were unable to produce any honey but our hopes are higher this year. All the bees came through the winter very well and all six hives are looking healthy. The weather turned for the worse in April which didn't help matters and delayed any hopeful harvests as quite a bit of the honey reserves were gobbled up by the bees to keep them going through the horrible days (comfort eating!). As is the case with the rest of the farm we are in need of a calm, sunny period to get us going again. Lets keep our fingers crossed for honey later on in the summer!

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The Bath Good Food Awards voting end this Saturday on 30th June. We have voting cards in the shop and you can also vote
on-line through this link. We are going for the "Best Farm Shop" category so if you think we've got what it take please vote for us before Saturday! Click where it says VOTE HERE on the right!

In June I sent Mum & Dad down to Exeter with some of our finest offerings from the farm shop to enter the 2012 Taste of The West Awards. They were armed with our home reared Aberdeen Angus Beef sirloin, homemade chicken liver pate, spinach & feta lasagne and our chocolate brownies. We should be hearing in the next few weeks about how we did so keep your fingers firmly crossed!

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The long awaited, slightly sparkling version of Bob Honey's Midford Cider is now bottled and in the farm shop. We now have the sparkling version alongside the more traditional farmhouse cider and Bob Honey will be here on 7th of July to offer samples of both and talk about his cider making days in Midford, near Bath.

As Wimbledon kicks into action and British hopes are raised again we have the very best Somerset strawberries as well as a few of our own grown fruits to enjoy alongside uncle Geoff's Ivy House Farm cream. Summer is the time for fruits, we are currently enjoying some wonderful Wiltshire-grown gooseberries and soon to be, blueberries too. Nectarines & peaches have also just come into season and are beautifully ripe and juicy and best enjoyed now!

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Throughout June we have had some fantastic, high welfare British veal in the counter. All our veal has come from the Jurassic Coast in Dorest and has proved really popular. Much media attention has been drawn towards veal recently and we have made the decision to back British produced veal as its a really tasty and healthy meat that is produced to extremely high standards of animal welfare and just as importantly supports British farming. More information on the farm we source our veal from and the veal industry is available through the following link,

Click here to read more on our Rose Veal...

Over the last couple of weeks we have been developing more great sausage recipes such as smoky barbecue pork, venison and our new version pork & fresh leek. In addition to this we have a few special offers from the butchery to take advantage of whether your dining indoors or out!

Pork Chops 6 for £4
Homemade Beef Burgers 6 for £4.50
Marinated Chicken Skewers 10 for £8

All our meat is cut straight from whole carcasses, in-house and so we are able to offer all the cuts from our own beef, pork and lamb. If you are tempted by a certain recipe, want to try out an old fashioned cut or just wanting something a bit unusual please let us know and we can prepare it especially for you.

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From the kitchen this month we have launched our new range of homemade treats available from the deli counter. Along with our own scotch eggs we have tartlets, an assortment of pies and salads to compliment our other fine produce from the kitchen. Our homemade meat pies use only our own high welfare, high quality meat from our farm and local farmers. You can try our pies in the cafe too as we will have a select range on our daily specials board. Choose from Steak & Willy Good Ale, Lamb with Mint and New Potato, Chicken & Leek and Pea and Ham pies.

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On July 14th we will be celebrating Bastille Day to give a bit continental flair to our events calendar! We will be hosting our first ever boules competition at the farm and teams can be entered now. If you wish to enter a team in this year's competition you will need to sign up in the shop. Team entry fee is £20 per team and proceeds will be going to Cancer Research UK.

We will also be joined by Great Western Wine from 12pm to taste some of our range of wines along with some cheese in true French fashion at our deli counter. A few french specials will be served up in the cafe too so not for the first time in the newsletter, lets hope the sun shines!

This month we have also launched WildFit. WildFit is a not-for-profit social enterprise that aims to make a real difference to the community. Specialist skills are used to design the ultimate fitness and well-being trails, parkour circuits and eco-gyms in the local community. Trails will set off from the farm shop on Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Thursdays for different abilities to get fit and enjoy the countryside. The first session is free so there's no excuse to try it out!

For more information on all our events check our noticeboard at the farm shop or our events page.

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Flower workshops will be going ahead on 16th and 17th July. If you have always wanted to learn how to arrange a hand-tie of stunning flowers, now is your chance! Come and enjoy an evening with Young Blooms, pimms will be served and there will be a short demonstration from Grace & Laura. They will be on hand to guide you through as you learn how to create a hand-tie. Workshop cost will be £50 and will run from 7pm till 9pm, to book please phone 01225 580271, or 07980199452.

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The BBC Good Food and Farming Awards have launched for 2012. This is what the awards are for...

"This award celebrates the local shops that enrich our lives, selling delicious, carefully sourced and affordable food. High street butchers, bakers and delis, farm and community shops - tell us what's great about their food, and the difference they make to your community and local food producers"

If you think we fit the bill please nominate us through the following link. Thanks!

BBC Food & Farming Awards Nominations 2012

We look forward to seeing you soon.

All the best,
Tom

June on the Farm

A few days of sun and everything seems a bit brighter! Since the rain and cold have packed their bags life has started to appear once again - better late than never I suppose. This month we have our regular updates from the farm shop and cafe along with news from our resident florists, Young Blooms and our resident market gardener, Kate Collyns.

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Throughout May we have been savouring some incredible asparagus from the Wye Valley. Unfortunately all good things must come to an end and with the asparagus season the end is always much sooner than we want. We only have a week or two left so if you haven't made the most of these delicious spears yet make sure you do soon! However as we say good bye to one much-loved British treasure we say hello to another. English strawberries are finding their way to our shelves now and as the sun continues to shine they will only get better. There's plenty to celebrate this summer so we have also got stocks of some rather fantastic local sparkling wine. While stocks last we will be offering our Avonleigh Sparkling Wine for just £14.99 per bottle, perfect to wash down those strawberries and cream (Ivy House Cream of course). On the subject of our beloved Ivy House Farm we have also managed to get our hands on some beautiful handmade chocolate from Lick The Spoon. Diana makes all her chocolate in her chocolate factory in Corsham, Wiltshire. She has also paired up with my Uncle Geoff Bowles from Ivy House to use some of his organic Jersey cream in some of her creations. We have a great selection now in the farm shop that make perfect treats and gifts for all. Why not add some to one of our handmade and bespoke hampers for Father's Day this 17th June?

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This week we will have our spring lamb in the counter. Through the summer months we will be sourcing our spring lamb from Steve Bowles (another uncle!) at Church Farm and also Jamie Fielden from Hill House farm in Box. Our spring lamb has had much more time to graze the spring pastures than much of the mass produced spring lamb which focuses on churning out young lambs in bulk to hit the early spring market. Our spring lamb is still beautifully tender but has more flavour than earlier lamb. Whether it be a butterflied leg marinaded for the BBQ or chops for the grill it can't be beaten at this time of year!

Although not really the time of year for game we are very pleased to have found a great game dealer very locally to us to keep us stocked up with wild game through the year. On the counter recently has been some locally shot venison steaks and haunches as well as burgers and sausages. As the game season approaches towards autumn we will have plenty more on offer too.

Much attention and effort has very quickly been drawn to our barbecue range as the summer is sprung upon us. Our butchers have been working hard devising new products for the counter as well as giving the counter a bit of an uplift too! Throughout the week you will find all our delicious homemade burgers and sausages both on the counter and in handy grab and go packs too. The order book is filling quickly for this weekend too so if you want to take advantage of some of our homemade and home reared meat from the counter phone the butchers on 01225 864948 and celebrate the Jubilee weekend in style!

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Kate has been sulking over the last month as she's not been able to get onto the land because of the terrible weather; plus the slugs have been wreaking havoc on her early crops such as carrots, spinach and beetroot – even in the polytunnels. Now she has had her revenge after collecting a punnet-load and giving them to the ducks as a treat; plus this lovely warm weather means they should stay away now too. She's finally managed to plant her tomatoes out in one tunnel: a mixture of heritage varieties and new tasty breeds, from orange cherry toms and golden yellow vine tomatoes, to delicious pink Berner Rose beafsteak, and even a 'black' variety! Fingers crossed we can enjoy them in a couple of months, as long as the sun plays the game! (Don't forget to keep up to date with Kate's blog too)

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Some beautiful summer flowers are now available to include peonies, hydrangea, stocks and delphiniums. They have a larger selection in the workshop too with ready made bunches and plants by the fruit and veg in the farm shop.

Summer workshops are now available! Book to make a gorgeous hand-tie and contemporary arrangement.Come and have some pimms see a demonstration and have a go. Courses are £50 per person to include all materials flowers and liquid refreshment and will be running on 16th and 17th July 7-9pm.  To book call Laura and Grace on 01225 580271 or pop in or email us on info@youngblooms.co.uk

Weddings are in full flow , you can always pop in have a look and say Hi, as of 1st June come see our floral queen being created in celebration of  her 60 years on the throne too!

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This weekend is the Winsley Community Barn Dance to celebrate the Queens Jubilee. The Winsley Jubilee Committee will be holding the event at Hartley Farm. Tickets are in very short supply and will almost certainly sell out before Friday so if you were planning to buy tickets don't leave it to the last minute! Tickets are £10 for adults and £5 for children under 12. We will have a hog roast and a bar stocked with local ciders and Ale from our resident microbrewers, Willy Good Ale. On the pumps will be High Five as well as bottles of their limited edition Betty's Brew which is also available now from the farm shop!

On the 14th July we will be hosting our Boules and Moules day too. The day will include a family beach boules tournament along with tastings of some French fayre to mark the Bastille day celebrations. Details on how to enter Boules teams and events for the day will be release soon!

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I also wanted to take this opportunity to say a few words by way of a tribute to my grandfather, Bert Bowles, who sadly passed away last week as I'm sure many of you in the community will have heard. Known to me and all us grandchildren as Pappy, he was and will continue to be a huge influence to me and all the Bowles family particularly with our proud farming heritage that he was central to and we strive to continue. He will be remembered well by all of us and all his friends. Pictures of him farming the local land will continue to stand proud in our farm shop.

All the best
Tom 

Meat from Hartley Farm

We're often asked in the farm shop "why is you meat different from the rest?" so I thought we probably arent telling the story properly. We take alot of pride in what we are trying to do here at Hartley Farm so I thought it would be useful for us to tell everyone in a little more detail what goes into every joint, cut and sausage that gets put in our meat counter every day.

Why Choose Us?

 

With 5 generations and well over 100 years of faming experience in the family we take things seriously. It is our belief that the same high level of care and attention should be applied throughout an animals life from field all the way through to fork. Meat has become a commodity in the last couple of decades and something which has caused every component of the meat production system to seek the most cost effective way of producing animals for slaughter. Not only has the welfare of the animal suffered but so to has the quality of the end product and now we have very bland meat that doesnt tick any of the boxes it was initially meant for but only the task of filling our bellies.

We choose to offer something different. We put a great deal of effort into choosing breeds and production systems that give the highest welfare for each of our animals and ultimately provides us with meat that is unrivalled in flavour. Our traditional breeds of animal from Aberdeen Angus and Hereford cattle to Gloucester Old Spot pigs grow slowly on natural fodder. This allows them develop fat and therefor flavour. This is not in the interest of the large scale retailers as time costs money and allows for variation and not a uniform cut of meat.

We take advantage of our local abattoir, H.F Stiles, just a few miles away which minimizes any stress caused in transport which is hugely influential in the quality of the meat. Our carcasses are then delivered back to us where we are able to hang and mature them in our cold rooms to maintain complete control and deliver the same level of care as we did on the farm. Our butchers then handle and cut the meat using traditional butchery methods to offer all the cuts throughout the carcass being careful to utilise the whole animal. Our counter offers everything from the big joint that forms the centrepiece of the traditional roast to dry aged steaks and something a little more creative for that mid week meal.

It is also important for us to mention that, although we will never choose compete with the multiples on price as we will always focus on quality, meat that you buy over the counter in supermarkets is often more expensive than our own.

Don't forget our butchers can cut to your specific requirement so if you're planning a dinner party, fancy a barbecue or want to try something a little more unusual please dont hesitate to get in touch!

Phone us on 01225 864948 or email us by clicking here .

Below is a little more information about the meat we offer from our butchers.

Beef

We rear traditional breeds of beef cattle such as Aberdeen Angus and Hereford. All our cattle graze our pastures throughout the year and are only "topped up" with haylage during the winter when the grass starts to slow down. Our pastureland is clover rich and is cared for without the use of fertilizers to keep the whole process as natural as possible. All our beef is hung and matured in house to keep complete control of the product we sell. The resulting beef is well marbled, tender and full of flavour. Whether it be a beautifully aged rib of beef for sunday roast, a succulent steak to fry in butter or some meltingly tender shin or beef to sit on the hob for the best part of a day, our beef is cut and handled to your specific requirement by our butchery team.

Pork

We keep the very best Gloucester Old Spot breeding sows in an outdoor system for the majority of the year. Like us, pigs dont always enjoy being outdoors when the weather turns so they retreat to our straw-bedded barns when the time suits. Gloucester Old Spots are notoriously slow growing breeds with plenty of fat. The pork we have in our counter is therefor from
animals that have had a chance to grow at their own pace and develop an unrivalled flavour. Our pork is almost unrecognisable from that of the pale, flavourless stuff you find on mass stacked high on the shelves of you know where! With our pork you will notice deep pinky colour with plenty of fat, the essential ingredient for perfect crackling. The meat is also the perfect consistency for our homemade sausages that we make from scratch in our butchery. This is how pork should be!

Lamb

Our lamb is reared by Tom’s uncle, Steve Bowles, at Church Farm. Church Farm has been in the Bowles family for many generations and is situated next door to Hartley Farm. Much of the land between the two farms is shared and Steve farms approximately 200 breeding ewes throughout the year on the pastures surrounding both the farms. Steve's lambs are Texel-Lleyn cross which produce hardy, well fatted lambs that grow well on the pastures on the farm. The resulting meat is well marbled, a deep shade of red with a good of cover fat that is essential for great tasting lamb when cooking. We also mature our lamb to bring out the full depth of flavour from the slow growing lamb which is a stark contrast to the bright pink and often tastless meat you may well find at the supermarket.


This bit of text now stands in our "Farm Butchery" section on the website for you to read whenever you want!

May at Hartley Farm

We have a packed edition of this month's update with lots to tell you about. I'll do my best not to mention the weather this month as I'm sure you're all as fed up as me about it!



Firstly a huge thankyou to all who attended our Easter Family Fun Day back at the start of April. We had a great turnout, much more than expected and many of you braved the afternoon downpours to be taken around the farm on our very popular farm tours. Both the Bath Chronicle and the Wiltshire times reported on the day with a few great photo's. A link to the story in the Bath Chronicle is below.

Click here to read our article in the Bath Chronicle!

Next on the calendar is the Winsley Community Barn Dance which we are hosting here at the farm on Saturday 2nd June. Tickets are available now and we are selling some from the shop. More details are available on the Winsley Community website or on our Events page.

We are also putting plans in place to celebrate Bastille Day on the 14th July in style with our very own Boules & Moules day! Soon we will be announcing more details on the day which promises to include a family "Beach Boules" tournament, tastings and specials of some French classics including moules mariniere, along with some wonderful French cheese and wine. Keep your eyes peeled on the website and on our noticeboard at the farm shop for more info soon!



National Honey Week is soon upon us in mid May and so we have invited Fred the Wiltshire

Busy Bees

Beekeeper to the farm shop on Sunday 13th May from 10am until 2pm to show off his range of local honey and beeswax gifts. Fred has been supplying the farm shop for a few years now and his local Wiltshire honey and bee pollen in particular are really popular so here's your chance to meet the man himself and talk about the birds and the bees!


We are just entering the fruitful season for fresh produce and so far this month year we have been enjoying Wye Valley asparagus, Yorkshire rhubarb, Bromham bunched carrots as well as bulls blood bunched beets and rainbow chard from our own fields. Soon enough our own home grown produce will be featuring heavily in the shop and on the cafe menu. Don't forget to keep up to date with our market gardening guru, Kate Collyns, through her blog.



Ed and the team have been planning a few updates to the butchers counter and over the next few weeks we will start to see these changes taking place. We have been working particularly hard on developing a few more meal solutions that takes the hassle out that timeless question "What shall we have for tea tonight?" As well as coming up with a few solutions ourselves we are still very keen to find out what you want from our butchers counter so please don't be shy and tell us. You can reply to this email with your suggestions and ideas, fill in one of our feedback forms in the shop or simply pop in for a chat!




The newest addition to the farm shop has been our new and improved range of frozen ready meals. We think we have started with a good range of meals that we hope you will all enjoy. Many of our lines are gluten free and all are homemade using our own produce from the farm as much as possible. We plan to add a few more lines too along with more desserts all produced from the our kitchen along with family sized portions too. As always we are looking for feedback so please let us know what you want from us.

Specials over the coming weeks include our carnivorous feast of slow roasted shoulder of Winsley lamb roll. Our roast baps have been really popular and this month our fabulous Winsley Lamb gets the headlines.



Firstly we wish Sarah, who works in the farm shop, the very best of wishes as she jets of to the Greek Islands this month to get married! Sarah has been busy planning the wedding ever since she started working here well over a year ago so please join us in wishing her and her fiancee Joel the very best of luck for the future!

Ted our 'young at heart' butcher has just completed his three day cycle to Illfracombe raising money for Dorothy House Hospice. Ted and his team managed to raise over £1500!

We are also really please to announce that Matt, who has been with us since we opened in 2008, has started an apprenticeship with us in our production kitchen. Many of you will know Matt for his smiley service and maybe most importantly his superb coffees. Matt's apprenticeship will last approximately 16 months which will gain him his qualification. Good luck Matt!

As we have mentioned before, our long term sustainable farming plans includes ideas to generate our own electricity. As more farm produce become available and the Farm Shop Kitchen and Cafe gets busier, we have an increasing power need for our refrigeration and cooking equipment. Last month we had some discussions with Bath & West Community Energy who have experience and ideas with renewable energy projects that involve and benefit the whole community. We will let you know how these ideas progress and look forward to hearing your thoughts too.

Lastly we just wanted to include a quick note from our cafe team. We are aware that at times and particularly during the weekend we can get very busy. We are working very hard on addressing how we handle this over the summer and we have a few plans in place to help manage the demand to ensure our service doesn't drop. If you have experienced some delays we are sorry but please be assured we are working very hard to overcome this and hope to improve as the summer goes on. Thank you in advance for your understanding.

Easter at Hartley Farm

Spring has well and truly sprung and its seems almost straight into summer! We have been busy at the farm putting the finishing touches to our outside areas as I'm sure many of you will have noticed. We have also been putting plans to our Easter event happening on Easter Saturday the 7th April. Before we get stuck into that here is some news from Hartley Farm over the last few weeks.



To kick off the Spring we have launched a number of new products in the shop. The first of this seasons Isle of Wight tomatoes from The Tomato Stall have gone down a storm with the pink beefsteaks proving hugely popular as the salads replace the stews! We also welcome back Bob Honey's Midford cider to the shop along with some rather marvellous sparkling Pilton cider all perfect partners to the British barbecue! We have also managed to get our hands on some great new rapeseed oil produced nearby just outside of Bath. Bath Harvest Oil is a beautiful rapeseed oil that is the perfect base for frying, marinading and dressing salads. These are just some of the highlights but we have plenty more too! Our taster days will be planned soon too to intropduce some of our new suppliers!

We still have lots of incredible Easter treats in store too so pop iin and stock up for the Easter weekend!

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We have guaranteed our source of lamb this Easter from Uncle Steve Bowles. Steve farms his sheep at Church Farm, next door to us, on the same pastures we use for our cattle. His lambs are grass fed and reared outdoors in the fields between Winsley and Conkwell and is the same succulent, full flavoured lamb we have been serving from the counter in recent weeks.

Our own dry aged Aberdeen Angus beef is also available and our pork is currently from Hill House Farm in Box, farmed by Jamie Feilden and his team at Jamie's Farm.

Our lamb in particular but also beef and pork will be very popular for Easter weekend so please phone the farm shop on 01225 864948 for any enquiries or to reserve yours before we run out.

Please feel free to drop in and talk to our butchers about your requirements, they will be only too pleased to help out!

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Family Fun Day

Easter Saturday 7th April 10-4pm

On Easter Saturday we will be opening up our farm for the day to explore with our tractor and trailer Farm Tours and Farm Trails. We will also be welcoming local children's author Tim Lerwill, or Farmer Tim as he may well be better known to read his new book "Market Day".

Our Farm Tours will be departing at 10:30am, 12:30pm and 1:30pm from the front of the farm shop. The tours will be on our tractor and trailer and ferry you around the farm to see our animals as well as learning about how we look after our farm and the environment too.

Our Farm trail will also take you around our farm, this time on foot, with a different route to be enjoyed at your own pace! We will also have a special Easter Trailblazer Quiz sheet available from the farm shop with the answers to be found out along the trail!

Farmer Tim will be reading from his new book Market Day in our marquee at 11:30am and 3pm. Kids and big kids alike can settle down for story time and get their copies of his three books; Snow Sheep, The Vegetable Patch and Market Day all signed by Farmer Tim himself!

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In other news you'll be pleased to hear we have a new noticeboard! I'm sure many of you may not see this as big news but it is for us! Our old noticeboard was struggling to keep up with its workload, promoting events here and in the community. Our new noticeboard is in our covered area at the font of the shop. If you have something you want to advertise please let us know. We ask for a 50p donation to a chosen charity for 2 weeks on the board!

Over the next few weeks our Pet's Corner area will start to receive some new guests! Keep your eyes peeled for bantams, rabbits and guinea pigs to keep everyone entertained over the summer months.

That's all for our Easter edition - make sure our Family Fun Day is in your diary (7th April!) and we wish you all a great Easter.

All the best,
Tom

Easter Family Fun on the Farm!

Farmer Tim

Easter Saturday (April 7th) will go down as our latest exciting event at Hartley Farm. As part of our first ever Easter Family Fun Day celebration, we will be hosting a children’s book launch by celebrity local author Tim Lerwill.

Best known for his ‘Farmer Tim’ stories – aimed at 3 to 8-year-old’s – Tim will be giving readings from his new book ‘Market Day’ in our garden marquee at 11.30am and 3pm. The readings are free to anyone visiting our Family Fun Day and children will be able to get into the spirit of farm adventures as they listen to Tim’s tales in a real farm setting.

We will also be offering tractor and trailer rides around the farm, Easter eggs galore, as well as face painting and other fun activities to keep the family entertained. It’s also easy to access with free parking so makes a great out of town event location for anyone living in Bath, Bradford on Avon or the surrounding countryside

We’re even hoping to complete our new farm trail in time for the Easter Saturday event so that visitors can explore the countryside around the farm and meet some of our pigs, chickens, sheep and cows – all reared outdoors.

We’re really pleased that Tim has chosen to launch his new book here and that we’re able to bring some of his farm tales to life through our setting!

Tim will be signing copies of his books throughout the day and there will be the opportunity to buy copies of all his stories at a special discounted price at Hartley Farm Shop

The farm café will also be open all day for full English breakfast, brunch, lunch, snacks, cream teas, cakey treats including hot cross buns, and the best coffee for miles around!

Spring Time!

Spring is almost here and at last we are past the worst of the cold weather. It hit us late this year but more than made up for it with freezing weather which always brings tricky times to the farm! Our Angus cattle are more than up to the challenges with climates similar to those of the Highlands in their native Scotland! Our more demanding Gloucester Old Spot pigs on the other hand weren’t quite as prepared and so seeked refuge in our straw barns for a few weeks whilst the worst of the cold passed. I think all our animals will be looking forward to springtime as much as us now!

March is usually a quiet month on the farm with many seeds being sown but little harvested. Our market gardener Kate will be hard at workpreparing her beds for another fruitful summer. She has also started her ownblog which you can find on our website if you wish to keep in touch with progress in our veggie patch!

This month we will be putting the finishing touches to our Mother’s Day plans. Plenty of mum gifts will be in the farm shop so don’t despair! We are also hoping to host our Mother’s Day lunch too on Mothering Sunday so keep your eyes peeled on our events page as details unfold.

Fairly soon after Mothers Day, Easter is here! This year’s Easter celebrations will be bigger than before as we welcome the spring and open the farm for the day. On Easter Saturday we will be hosting local children’s author Tim Lerwill for the launch of his new title along with Easter egg hunts and farm walks.  Once again we will have more details on the event closer to the time.

All the best

Tom