Welcome to the SRT blog No. 56

Posted on June 10, 2021 in Welcome to the SRT Blog

11th June 2021 – Welcome to our blog post No. 56

So the big news this week – the BBC were filming at HFG to see all of the perennials we have grown for the Hampton Court Show as well as interviewing some of the trainees. The BBC team came up from Bath specially, and after over 5 hours filming on a hot and steamy day it was a ‘wrap’!

Looks like we may be part of the BBC Hampton Court features, on 3 days over the week long coverage – 7mins long. Will let you know days and times when we find out. Hampton Court is on from Monday 5^th July until Sunday 11^th.

And what a lovely week it’s been – sun all the way.

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Seed paper making with David at Northchurch – starts by pulping shredded paper with plenty of water in a blitzer.

Stef is painting the Hampton Court gift tags seed paper. Using vegetable dyes and all made by the team of craft trainees at Northchurch these are truly unique!

Matthew mowing front of shop which is the perfect spot for customers to the farmshop and café.

The goats had a visitor sharing their food.

Northchurch did their first moth trap, which saw a large number collected and lots of fun was had by all. Including the moths. Plenty of interesting species found and identified from the book.

Sheep grazing their new area – after the fencing had been completed.

And a very hot day making wooden dibbers with Sean protecting his head from the sun

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The team helping with watering the new growing spaces on site for Age UK.

The Activity Centre and Northchurch teams joined up to work on an outside contract over in Kings Langley, re-laying a path which needed lots of old shingle removed and then laying self binding gravel so that the village garden is now more accessible for all.

Noreen and Luka on the outside contract at St Peters Church, in Berkhamsted – weeding.

Development of the nature trail continues with the laying of the mypex. This will then be covered with self binding stones to provide a wheelchair access to the fruit & tree area.

Because of the recent hot and sunny weather, the worms have been moved from the greenhouse to next to the compost heaps. They have been dong what worms do, eating all the kitchen scraps and are producing a fine ‘compost’.

The kitchen are trialing a new idea – ‘Kitchen Essences’. These can be used in baking and they have made several flavours – orange, lemon, lime, cinnamon and coconut. The tester batches will diffuse of the next 6 weeks so we can then test the final flavour and colour.

The weekly tasks of mowing, weeding and strimming continues – it’s that time of year, non stop!

The cloudy weather didn’t allow for a viewing of the partial solar eclipse yesterday. The team were all ready with their cardboard with the hole in, to protect the eyes from looking directly at the sun, but not this time. Save them for the next one – 25^th October 2022

And the market team are back on Berhamsted high street on a Thursday morning, selling all the Sunnyside produce, fruit, veg, eggs and apple juice.

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At HFG we are planning the site opening of the bakery on the 21^st June as it will be ready to go then. There will be a grand opening later in July.

On the 21st June, they are also planning a Summer solstice / end of bedding contract, with the first ever bakery group due to bake for the joint celebration afternoon!

The Hampton Court products are nearly all ready to be put together – here’s all the painted bees and ladybirds for the Tic, Tac, Toc game.

The bedding plants have all been dispatched to Dacorum and have been seen popping up in roundabouts and beds throughout the local area. We now have a great supply of annuals for sale in the shop and expect to be busy selling them through June and beyond.