Pick-your-own farms are as much part of the traditional British childhood
summer as donkey rides along the beach and sack races on sports day,
conjuring images of long, hot days spent scrabbling in the strawberry beds.
No wonder there was an outcry recently when one Cornish farm closed to the
picking public because of fears about meeting health and safety regulations,
along with rising insurance premiums.
Numbers have certainly dwindled since their heyday in the 1980s. The PYO
movement started in America, where they are called “U-Picks”. The idea took
off here as we packed our newfangled chest freezers with prodigious amounts
of self-picked fruit — then supermarkets became better at providing fresh
produce, more women went out to work, and people found themselves with less
time and more cash. Frankly, we had better things to do with our weekends.
The number of pick-your-own farms in Britain gradually fell from about 5,000
to between 750 and 1,000 today.
But thanks to this year’s sun bringing plenty of fruit and more visitors to
the countryside, and a renewed interest in “getting back to the land”, there
are signs of a resurgence. Those PYO farms that survived have become bigger
and better, adapting to modern tastes.
Nowadays you rarely see just stark rows of strawberry plants and a small kiosk
for the cash; there is a good chance that you will also find a café, a
“maize maze” and perhaps a bouncy castle — all the necessary diversions for
a family day out. “Really I’m in the leisure industry,” says Richard
Stanley, a jolly farmer in a faded raspberry-coloured shirt. He owns Rectory
Farm, just outside Oxford, acclaimed as “best PYO 2008” by the farming
retail trade association FARMA. “People are not just picking strawberries,
they are coming to a farm with lots of space where their children can run
around.”
The farm’s open-air café is full of families and friends enjoying the
sunshine. On Sundays, on-duty dads can be spotted relaxing with the
newspapers and a cappuccino after sending the children scampering off to
pick lunch.
Stuart Beare, of Tulleys Farm in Crawley, West Sussex, reckons that his
takings are up 20 per cent so far this year. He was among the pioneers of
the “family entertainment” approach to PYO, offering visitors a daunting
maize maze (this year’s design, a vast eight-acre chicken, has more than
three miles of paths and takes an hour to complete). Not only is the weather
better so far than it was in the past two wet summers, but Stuart also
senses a change in the air. “People are coming away from factory farming to
a natural product,” he says. “Pick-your-owns fit the mood of the nation.”
And, of course, there is the cost saving. Prices for PYO are generally a good
deal less than supermarkets can offer, especially for delicate fruit such as
raspberries, which can be half the supermarket cost per kilogram at about
£5.50. To get the most discount you must pick more than just a punnet or two
— more like a 5kg trayful of fruit — but all the produce is cheaper, even if
you buy it ready-picked in the farm shop.
What’s more, for taste and quality there is no comparison with the
store-bought alternative. Essington Fruit Farm in Staffordshire, for
example, has ten named varieties of strawberry on sale, including Alice,
Symphony and Korona, and others that are on trial. Sometimes tablefuls of
strawberries are put out for tasting, to attract customers and gain feedback
on their preferences.
This renewed emphasis on taste is all part of the general move for PYOs to be
more than just farms. Many sell local cream, cheese and meat as well as
fruit and veg. Brocksbushes in Northumberland makes ready meals from its own
produce. Alder Carr, a PYO in Suffolk, has become famous for its ice creams,
with gooseberry and elderflower the most popular flavours (even though
gooseberries are an unpopular fruit for pickers).
Because of the variety and freshness of the produce, some customers treat
their local PYO rather like a greengrocer’s shop. Rather than doing a single
pick for the freezer, they may make regular fortnightly or even weekly
visits. Others come for an afternoon’s outing before a barbecue or dinner
party, perhaps picking some extra berries for jam and some raspberry coulis
for the freezer.
Then there are the school-holiday and after-school family outings. “Mothers
come with their kids because they came as children,” says Caroline
Dickinson, who runs Brocksbushes. She sometimes spots courting couples on a
strawberry-picking date. This year one such couple are even having their
wedding reception on the farm.
As for the produce itself, the range has increased greatly. Where once it
would have been strawberries only, now you may find blueberries, tayberries
and cultivated blackberries, as well as raspberries and all the currants:
black, red and white. Then there are apples, plums and sometimes cherries
and cobnuts, as at Maynards, near Bewl Water on the Kent/Sussex border.
Some PYO farms sell novelties that are unavailable in normal shops. Essington
Fruit Farm has had a hit with Marionberries, a cross between an American
black raspberry and a blackberry. “It looks like a long blackberry and has
an exquisite flavour,” says owner Richard Simkin.
Alongside the fruit, many PYOs have vegetables — dig-your-own as well as
pick-your-own. What could be nicer, or simpler to cook, than new potatoes
fresh from the ground or small, sweet summer carrots? The season starts with
asparagus and goes on to ridge cucumbers, beans, spinach and even herbs.
Sweet vegetables such as peas and sweetcorn start to lose sugars and
vitamins as soon as they are picked. Here you get them at their peak, rather
than deadened by the supermarket chilled supply chain. A few farms have
branched out into flowers, too, so you can go home with a carful of fragrant
sweet peas as well as strawberries.
New varieties have extended the traditional season — you can even pick
strawberries in early September. One of the biggest PYOs in the country, the
120-acre Garsons in Surrey, has 40 kinds of fruit and vegetables and is open
until Hallowe’en (for pumpkins, naturally).
The farmers I spoke to said that their biggest problem, without a doubt, was
neither health and safety nor insurance premiums but bad weather.
Brocksbushes was down £50,000 on strawberries after last year’s washout.
Some doughty people do arrive with umbrellas and and pick in their wellies
in the rain but, by and large, PYO is a fair-weather activity.
The main agricultural pests, apart from birds, are the pickers themselves.
Taste-as-you-go is part of the deal — until it is taken too far. Richard
Stanley at Rectory Farm has even seen the occasional group who bring their
own cream and sit down at the farm’s café tables for a free meal. “It upsets
the other customers as much as anything else,” he says. Richard Whitman, the
owner of FARMA’s 2009 PYO of the Year, Parkfield, just north of Enfield in
Middlesex, is one of those who have introduced a minimum pick fee (of £1.50
a person). “It’s a way to stop people using us as a free buffet,” he says.
Another problem is inexperienced picking. Farms give guidance but lack of
knowledge can be a problem, for example when raspberries are yanked roughly
off bushes before their time, damaging the plant’s stem and next year’s
crop. Maynards is known for its cherries, grown on dwarf trees for easy
picking, but these, too, can unwittingly be picked unripe.
How to keep what you pick? Gooseberries, raspberries and currants are fine to
freeze and all fruit can be frozen in ice-cream and sorbets. To save freezer
space, bottle and pickle fruit and vegetables as well as making chutneys and
jams. You don’t need to be super-industrious — even a jar or two makes a
home-made treat or a special present. Whether you eat the produce fresh or
keep it for a rainy day, the PYO is back. Summertime is here, and the
picking is easy.
To find your local PYO, go to www.farma.org.uk/
Take your pick...
Check farm websites for updates on which fruit is ready to pick. The
weather and busy times affect availability.
With strawberries, pick the green calyx as well as the berry to improve
keeping quality.
Pick earlier in the day or on an overcast day if you want the fruit to
last for a few days.
Pick in shallow trays or punnets rather than baskets, to prevent
delicate fruit such as raspberries from squashing.
Combine your harvests. A handful or two of blackcurrants or gooseberries
will improve the set of strawberry jam with their pectin.
Freeze blackcurrants and redcurrants as picked. The frozen fruit is then
easy to rub off the stalks.
