It’s hotting up this week, in more ways than one!
Ian’s back from his well-earned break and his holiday probably feels like a distant memory as it’s been busy busy busy this week getting ready for the onslaught of harvest. This means cleaning down all the machinery and grain stores and checking everything is in first class working order. Here’s our new tractor that arrived earlier in the week - it’s a general purpose tractor which will be used mostly for corn carting and rolling crops in the Autumn.
The sunshine in the past few days has been amazing for the crops. We all know that crops need sunshine and rain to grow, but did you know that sunshine can have such a significant effect on essential oil production that each hour of sunlight, right down to the day of harvest, can make a difference to the oil yield? That’s because the sun helps the oil capsules in the peppermint leaf develop.
Here’s a view of our peppermint field yesterday – isn’t it a beauty? We’re about 3-4 weeks away from harvest.
And how stunning is this camomile? We’re only about 10 days from harvest, when there’ll be even more flowers and Ian says it will look like a “field of snow”.
Ian has already done a bit of harvesting and distilling this week of the camomile over winter crop – it produced 3 kilos of camomile oil for our tea, so not at all bad.
What else has been going on around the farm? We’ve been desiccating the oilseed rape getting ready for harvest – evening out the crop makes it much easier for the combine to work its magic in two weeks time.
And we’re going to be planting more lavender tomorrow. Did you know it takes our lavender three years to look this good and be ready for harvest?
Now this photo of the warehouse may look a little bit dull, but greatly satisfying. If you’re a bit of a tidier and like your house being in ship-shape order, you’ll appreciate having everything organised. We’ve been refitting the warehouse with extra racking to maximise space for our expanding range and Christmas stock.
It was hot work stacking pallets but we do hope this sunshine continues for the next two weeks at least....
aning down all the machinery and grain stores and checking everything is in first class working order. Here’s our new tractor that arrived earlier in the week - it’s a general purpose tractor which will be used mostly for corn carting and rolling crops in the Autumn.
The sunshine in the past few days has been amazing for the crops. We all know that crops need sunshine and rain to grow, but did you know that sunshine can have such a significant effect on essential oil production that each hour of sunlight, right down to the day of harvest, can make a difference to the oil yield? That’s because the sun helps the oil capsules in the peppermint leaf develop.
Here’s a view of our peppermint field yesterday – isn’t it a beauty? We’re about 3-4 weeks away from harvest.
And how stunning is this camomile? We’re only about 10 days from harvest, when there’ll be even more flowers and Ian says it will look like a “field of snow”.
Ian has already done a bit of harvesting and distilling this week of the camomile over winter crop – it produced 3 kilos of camomile oil for our tea, so not at all bad.
What else has been going on around the farm? We’ve been desiccating the oilseed rape getting ready for harvest – evening out the crop makes it much easier for the combine to work its magic in two weeks time.
And we’re going to be planting more lavender tomorrow. Did you know it takes our lavender three years to look this good and be ready for harvest?
Now this photo of the warehouse may look a little bit dull, but greatly satisfying. If you’re a bit of a tidier and like your house being in ship-shape order, you’ll appreciate having everything organised. We’ve been refitting the warehouse with extra racking to maximise space for our expanding range and Christmas stock.
It was hot work stacking pallets but we do hope this sunshine continues for the next two weeks at least....