Greetings everyone. We hope you’re enjoying the warmer temperatures as much as we (and the plants) are. Things are really starting to come to life in the propagation house; the tulips are exploding, all of our onions have germinated, and lots of other field crops are on their way, so it's really great to see so much finally springing when it's still so grey outside.
We've had loads of seeds delivered this week, and Linda's been doing a wonderful job organising everything and making sure that we are ready for not just our tunnel plantings and propagation sowings but also for sowing direct into the fields, which will begin soon. There are loads of things to organise, not least because we need to get our derogations sorted for our next biodynamic inspection.
The spring cleaning tasks continue, and we’ve been going through the pack barn, making sure everything’s spick and span, while Andy has been doing a deep clean of our walk-in fridge. We also have an environmental health inspection next week, so we're ensuring that the winter cobwebs have been blown away and that things are ready for the season ahead.
Many of our winter salads are finished, so Paul’s been busy flipping tunnels and preparing the soil for new crops. We've had lots of pretty heavy pigeon damage to the fields - a lot of our neighbouring farmers are also really suffering. For some reason, this winter the flocks have been much bigger and they’ve done so much more damage to the field crops. So we're turning our attention inside for the moment, ensuring we're up to speed with our succession planting. We’ve been busy sowing radishes, baby turnips, loads of different delicious salad greens like rocket, wild rocket, mustards, pak choy, all the different mizunas and then some lovely early spring herbs as well. Expect those tender crops to be ready in just a few weeks.
Calixta’s crop of the week is the Icoon tulip, a really gorgeous double peony type in a fiery orange which is stunning in its appearance as well as its abundance. Again, it’s a welcome burst of colour at a time of year when we really need it, so it’s been a real joy harvesting and wrapping them for deliveries. Seasonal tulips are something we’re so passionate about bringing to you. We’re only just getting started this year, with loads more colours to come, available as mixed wraps and individual bunches.
Speaking of flowers, the peonies are coming along nicely and we’ve just spotted the very first tiny buds pushing their way up through the soil. They're in quite an exposed site in the corner of our new field, so we've been keeping a close eye on them and waiting patiently for them to emerge. Next week we will begin our process of mulching, putting down MyPex for weed control and running irrigation so that they're ready for the season ahead. It's really exciting that they’re up; we planted thousands and thousands of them in the autumn which was a really big job for the team so it’s great to see them growing and healthy. It’s a long-term investment as we're not expecting the first flowers this year; it will be a couple of years for them to get fully established.
In other news, we had the team from Manteca out for a visit this week and they did an amazing job helping out. They mulched the flower field, moved some tulips, and helped us put up a load of hoops for the tunnels. It was amazing to get them all up in one big push.
Cameron and Josh putting on the purlin bars on the new tunnels
After all their hard work, Manteca’s day ended with a tour of the farm. This time of year, it can be difficult to inspire people because all of the summer crops are in their very infant stages, and there's quite a lot of scarcity, but we had a good time chatting about green manures, biodiversity and how climate change affects the farm. We also shared how we work with restaurants and chefs and the differences between our farm and our neighbours and other organic farms.
We’re saying a fond farewell to radicchio this week, but we're really looking forward to the first foraged items of spring arriving, and hopefully in a couple of weeks we’ll start to have things like wild garlic and nettle tips. Dare we say it - spring is around the corner!
