Beautiful beets from Frith Farm!!!!

Exciting times!

Our 1st veg box collection will be ready a week tomorrow - for those of you already signed up, start getting excited!

For those of you who would still like to sign up, but haven't, we still have some veg box spaces available from 22nd July - get yourself signed up!

Benefits:
1. Chemical free
2. Hand picked on the same day
3. Grown for flavour - the FLAVOUR!!!!
4. Grown locally - support your local, small scale farm
5. Grown locally - trace-ability, low carbon footprint
6. need we say more?
7. OK then... top quality food, grown by people you'll meet
8. Get healthy

For more info visit our website www.frithfarming.com ... See more

Just one week to go! Don't forget to come and see us in the BBOWT Wildlife Zone

ONE WEEK TO GO! Lots of exciting new attractions await you at BBC Countryfile Live this year. Set in the beautiful grounds of Blenheim Palace from the 3-6 August, our action-packed show includes live arena shows, activities exploring nature, animal displays, debates, music, food, drink, shopping and more! It's not too late to book if you havent done already: https://countryfilelive.com/tickets ... See more

This week we've got a fruity #fridaytip for you...

Thin out #apples and #pears to get a perfect crop of good sized fruit. Firstly remove any diseased, damaged or unusually small fruits.

Then carefully reduce numbers to no more than 2 or 3 per cluster. You will get larger sweeter fruits as a result - ideal for the perfect crumble or apple pie! 😋🍏🍐🥧

If you find our information useful you could help us to continue providing this advice by donating just £2 to Garden Organic today. Please text TIPS17 £2 to 70070 to donate. Thank you 😃 #fridaytip #organicgardening #fruits ... See more

The weather is set to be fine and sunny in #Upminster this Sunday. If you're in the area or you fancy a day trip out with a difference, then why not visit Frank's Cottages Open Garden.

This delightful #wildlife garden will be open on 30th July
between 12pm & 6pm in support of Garden Organic 😃 ... See more

Frank's Cottages Open Garden at: 8 Frank’s Cottages, St Mary’s Lane, Upminster RM14 3NUon: Sunday, 30 July 2017 - 12:00pm to 6:00pmTony Gunton and Pat Allen are generously opening their organic garden – a wildlife garden in the Metropolitan Green Belt near Upminster. Frank's Cottages boasts A half-a... ... See more

This week's #weedywednesday plant is #stinging #nettle - fierce, invasive but full of goodness!

The common #nettle is abundant throughout the UK.
Dried nettles provide excellent food for farm animals with a high protein content - despite the stalky nature it is easily digested. The flowers are a good source of pollen and nectar for butterflies 🦋

Did you know...
Stinging nettles also make the perfect soup 🍵 The nettles contain high levels of iron, calcium and magnesium & cooking will destroy the sting!

#weedywednesday #nettles #weeds #stingingnettle ... See more

On 3rd August we'll be heading off to be part of the 2017 BBC Countryfile Live show.

You'll find us located within the Berks, Bucks and Oxon Wildlife Trust - BBOWT Wildlife Zone alongside our Oxfordshire Garden Organic Master Composters.

Don't miss out on this action-packed four-day show, we look forward to seeing you there! ... See more

BBC Countryfile Live is delighted to be returning to the spectacular grounds of Oxfordshire’s historic Blenheim Palace from 3 - 6 August 2017.

We thought we'd share something bright & beautiful for today's #mondaymotivation.

The stunning Comma #Butterfly can be seen here taking a little rest upon an #Echinacea flower.

If you run, or are part of a community garden or group like Caldmore Community Garden, then you may be interested in one of our courses, held here at our gardens 🌿

Take a look at what we have to offer here...
http://www.gardenorganic.org.uk/our-courses ... See more

Yesterday we visited Garden Organic and took part in their excellent "Attracting Wildlife to Your Garden" course. While there, we learnt about this amazing bumblebee project - have a look at their website and become one of its contributors! ... See more

Our Sustainable Communities Manager, David Garrett was in #Cumbria on Saturday to kick start the first #volunteer training session with our brand new Master Composters project.

A great day was had by all!
#GetComposting #composting #mastercomposters #cumbria ... See more

We had a fantastic training session with Garden Organic today to kick off our Master Composter project.

Nine volunteers were given training on all things compost and left the day eager to share what they have learnt in their communities and help people across Cumbria to #GetComposting!

Watch them learning how to put together all sorts of different compost bins, starting with the Green Johanna... ... See more

Ongoing RHS trials reveal that #organic #slug pellets perform as well as toxic synthetic chemical ones – especially on #hostas.

This is good news for organic growers...

RHS trials - organic slug pellets perform better than those with toxic metaldehyde Ongoing RHS trials reveal that organic slug pellets perform as well as toxic synthetic chemical ones – especially on hostas. This is good news for organic growers. This two year scientific study aims to identify more… ... See more

Follow our 3 step #fridaytip holiday plan for safekeeping of #vegetables and #flowers in your absence.

#Weed, then #water, then #mulch. This will keep the soil moist in your absence. Lawn mowings make an excellent mulch, feeding nitrates into the soil. ... See more

Just preparing the new harvest seed of the Golden Chard. What a pretty plant!

The "Amanda" sweet peppers are incredible. Look, another huge harvest of fruit this morning! Seed from the first batch of these will be available online really soon. 🙂

Here's Tam spending an afternoon this week deseeding the "Amanda" sweet peppers. We love the pepper harvest - we all get a huge bucket of peppers to cook with once the seeds are taken out!

Amaranth! The Leaf Amaranth plants are flowering well now in the tunnel and it looks spectacular; they're about 12ft tall. New seed from them should be ready in late November.

Bulking up our super tasty new bean Princess - in the field earlier in the year, drying in the tunnel - and the catflap we installed so that Thompson can get in and protect all our drying seeds even when the tunnel is shut up! ... See more

A fairly large Pacific Giant squash - 27kg!

Squash harvest at Real Seeds! Here's Ian bringing in the hugely diverse Treugerat squash population. This is the start of a dehybridisation project; all these different squash came from seed in one pumpkin Ben found at a festival in France. We'll select the best and breed them true over the next 8 years. ... See more

A few photos from a busy harvest week at Real Seeds: Ian cutting the hedges back, Ben sorting the Special Swiss sweetcorn, a visit by the local Permaculture group and harvesting enormous sunflowers. (oh and not to forget Kate practicing Hamlet with a Polarnaya Siberian Cabbage...) ... See more

We've been getting the squash harvest in now, and this is interesting - the one at the bottom is a Sibley that was harvested *last year* - yes, 12 months ago! Stored on the dresser in a cool room, it's still in perfectly eatable condition. Now that's what you can call a good-storage variety! ... See more

This is why chemical farming is so wrong . Great timelapse photography of what happens if you remove all the organisms from the soil.

Bioturbation with and without soil fauna.