Linscombe Farm

Newsletter 2nd/3rd April 2009

Posted on Apr 02 2009 at 10:11 AM
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If you didn’t receive last week’s newsletter about what you do and don’t get in your weekly box (excluding vegetables) then please see the website news section. We also had a query about storing vegetables, and have re-posted an old newsletter about this – particularly tricky this time of year of course, as the end of the season approaches, and tricky with the dry, windy weather too (but we are NOT complaining about that!), which sucks the moisture out of the greens and they can go limp very quickly if not tended to and got into the fridge quickly.

 

Please note it’s Easter next week, so all the deliveries which would normally fall on Good Friday will be made a day earlier on Thursday 9th April instead – please note this especially if you are collecting from shop premises which will be closed on the Friday. Thanks.

 

Easter seems a good time to launch the sale of chicken eggs alongside the vegetables and fruit on the choice list. You can of course order your usual standard box and add these as an extra if you wish. Over the years, we have been approached by several people asking us to sell their eggs through the box and we have finally been persuaded by Ben’s Hens, who won the Soil Association Gold Award for eggs in 2008, so have impeckable credentials.  Ben, formerly of “Rod and Ben’s” box scheme south of Exeter, is now farming with his wife Alice, at the Land Heritage Summerhill Farm, Hittisleigh, so his hens are laying their eggs locally. The organic, free-range hens are a mix of Black Rocks (my personal favourite) Corals, Silver Nicks and Brown Nicks, so the eggs are a mix of colours and sizes. They really do taste great, but don’t just take our word for it, try them yourself. They are available at £1.80 for a half dozen, but if you order a dozen for Easter, we’ll do a special introductory offer of a dozen for £3.

 

As you hopefully already know, we are having an Easter Egg Hunt on Easter Sunday at Bidwell Barton, Upton Pyne, which will also involve other children’s activities such as decorating (hard-boiled) chicken eggs and for those of you feeling energetic, Tom is going to organise a pogo stick competition. For the Easter Egg Hunt turn up at any time between 10 and 12 noon. There will also be a short farm walk, which will be an opportunity to see where we have planted two and a half thousand (yes 2,500) trees, shrubs and hedging plants over the last three to four weeks. For those of you who joined us years after we had undertaken similar planting activities at Linscombe, then it really is worth seeing in its infancy and then looking again over the years as it all grows and becomes the home for all the birds and beasties, which of course, is one of the main reasons for doing it anyway, as well as for wind protection etc etc. In total at Linscombe we planted more than 10,000 trees and shrubs and certainly aim at doing a similar number, if not more, at Bidwell Barton. The farm walk will be at a specific time, so please see our website for details. We look forward to seeing you all then, and also this weekend at the Crediton Farmers’ Market

 

Enjoy your vegetables.  All the best Phil, Helen, Tom, David, James and Sam and the rest of the team.

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