Hay 2022

For the past two weeks the weather was only good for one thing - hay - so we took the opportunity to harvest ours. The temperature hit 32 degrees Celsius outside, and 54 degrees in one of our polytunnels, so this was very hot work. Because of these horrible weather conditions it was our fastest hay harvest to date, as it was dry before we even cut it, so didn't need turning or drying in the fields. There was not a drop of moisture anywhere. We cut the ragwort out of the fields on Tuesday, Clive cut the hay on Wednesday, then baled it on Thursday, we brought in 5 trailer-loads on Friday, and the final 2 on Saturday morning.

We couldn't access Hotel Field this year because of the allotment drainage channel being dug through the gateway, so we left that field standing, and cut Carn Field, Top Field, Far Field Middle, Far Field South, and Standing Stone Field. Top Field is a small field and had so little hay in it that we didn't even bale it, but the other 4 fields yielded 418 bales between them. 

Byron and Ross loading hay in the field.

The final 61 bales of hay loaded and ready to lead to the barn.

Team stacking in the open barn.

"Fiesta del campo" at the end of Saturday - drinking cold cider on the hay stack - with Abbie, Warren, Polly, Toby and James.

This year's hay is now for sale in the farmyard, at £3.50 per bale, and some of last years' too. Local delivery is available by arrangement.

Many thanks to everybody who helped with this year's hay harvest - Sim, Caedmon, Abby, Warren, Toby, James, Heather, Bea, Ross, and Byron - and also to Rosie for putting St. Just market together by herself because we were too busy, Polly for delivering the bulk of our veg boxes by herself because Hugh was on the tractor, and Holly for not only delivering veg boxes on the St. Just to St. Ives route, but also for buying all the cider!

A hectic week on the farm

This past week has been one of the craziest weeks on the community farm ever! We are suffering severely from the ongoing heatwave and drought, which is really affecting the quantity and quality of crops that we have now, and will have through the coming winter, so we have been irrigating as much as possible just to keep things alive in the hope of rainfall soon. At the same time, we are having a land drain installed across the top of the Allotment Field, to try to prevent the allotments getting so wet in the winter. The digger doing this work burst our water mains on Tuesday morning, so we had several hours with no water on the farm at all, and we had to take drinking water from our neighbour's kitchen just to keep ourselves hydrated. Tuesday's main task was removing ragwort from the hay meadows - very hot work. 

We have also been renovating the farmhouse kitchen, replacing both the floor and the ceiling, as well as many of the fittings, which resulted in both the power and the internet going down for some of Tuesday afternoon.

And we cut the hay, and brought it all in to the barn, one of the biggest itchiest sweatiest most-stressful jobs of the year - but we got it done (more on this later).

And St. Just Market began again, the first one since March 2020 (in the W.I. Hall from 09:30 till 12:30 every Saturday from now on), meaning more harvesting and packing and logistics, added to Sennen Market every Tuesday.

And two of our shop volunteers couldn't make it this week, and our two volunteer delivery drivers were both away, so well done and many thanks to Polly and Holly for stepping in to deliver 70 veg boxes between them as far afield as St. Ives and Ludgvan, on routes they'd never driven before.

Add to this our production of 90 veg-boxes all of our own vegetables, keeping the farm shop stocked daily, looking after 350 free-range hens, and it has been quite a week.....

Planting winter squash

On Tuesday 19th July we eventually got around to planting 600 winter squash (a.k.a. pumpkins) into our maincrop field, maybe 3 weeks too late for their own good, but the weather and time and person-power were against us, and better late than never....

We plan to get our squashes into the ground at the beginning of July, once all the leeks are in, but we took a break in planting leeks, and finished the leeks (all 6300 transplants of them) on the following Tuesday.

Many thanks to our team of volunteers on the day for seeing the task through to the end - Sim, Rob, Jez, Mick, Ruby, Lily, and Warren. Tuesday is one of the busiest days on the farm, with a team of local and (inter)national volunteers working together on tasks such as this one - if you would like to get involved please contact us via email, or call in.

Open Day photos

We held our summer open day (in cooperation with Open Farm Sunday) on July 10th, in a heatwave, having postponed the event from June 19th because of bad weather! So we had to shelter from the sun instead of from the rain, but still, a lot of people came along and helped us to celebrate the farm and our local community.

Just Ukes making their world premier performance in the farmyard.

Jill with her Hedgepigs and Hoglets Rescue charity stall.

One of our black bees getting acquainted with Bridget's beeswax candles.

Nick's spoon-carving workshop and stall.

Sophie's touch preserves and pickles stall.

The 'Oss from the Raffidy Dumitz band dancing in the farmyard.

Plus we had refreshments from the Community Cabin, a farm tour with our Head Grower, Lawrence the Potter demonstrating and selling pots in the yard, our farmshop, a book stall by donation, Warren's Welly Wanging in Four Acre Field, meet the chickens with one of our WWOOFers, and an open farm for the day. 

Many thanks to everybody who attended, for helping to put the community into the farm, and for all our volunteers who helped us set up and take down, organise and plan, and help on the day. And many thanks to all the musicians who performed!

Veg box delivery round

Two years ago we were the only vehicle on the road when delivering our veg boxes around the area every week during the lockdown(s). This photo was taken yesterday en-route to Zennor and St. Ives. Yesterday's big delivery round (our other smaller round in the other van takes in Heamoor, Penzance and Newlyn, including our community collection hub in the wonderful Redwing Gallery) wound around Newbridge, St. Just, Boscean, Pendeen, Zennor, St. Ives community collection hub, Ludgvan, Gulval, Paul, Kemyel, Crean, Trendrennan, Porthcurno, Trevescan, Sennen, Escalls, Tregiffian, Hendra, and the Cot Valley. Surely one of the most scenic veg box rounds there is???

Many many thanks to our small team of volunteer drivers for doing the bulk of our community deliveries - Chris, Joe, Polly and Ed. If anybody would like to join the community farm team as a volunteer delivery driver, in our vans, who has a few hours to spare on some Fridays, please contact us on info@bosaverncommunityfarm.org.uk. Many thanks!

Tomorrow's veg boxes

We will be out and about around Penwith tomorrow delivering our fresh not-for-profit veg boxes to collection hubs and member's homes. All the veg has come from the community farm and has been picked fresh yesterday and today. 

This week the seasonal veg in our boxes is:-

£7.70 box - basil, tomatoes, cucumber, pepper, rainbow chard, green French beans, and new potatoes.

£12 box - tomatoes, cucumber, pepper, rainbow chard, new potatoes, garlic, kale, blackcurrants, and green French beans.

We can add eggs, bread, milk, yoghurt, and honey as extras.

Veg boxes

We are now filling our weekly veg boxes with lovely summer produce - tomatoes, basil, cucumbers, new potatoes, blackcurrants, redcurrants, salad leaves, rainbow chard, spring onions, globe artichokes, bulb fennel, green peppers, green French beans, lemon verbena etc..

Small boxes cost £7.70 and have on average 6 items of veg. Standard boxes cost £12 and have on average 10 items of veg. Please email us to join our scheme and support the farm.

vegbox.bcf@bcents.org.uk