Looking back on the earlier part of 2024, it is hard to believe that the ground was ever going to dry up enough to get anything planted, let alone harvested this year. But here we are, at the beginning of September, and our crops are safely in the barn and everyone is happy.

At Great Farm we have 1000 hectares of arable land that we use to produce a selection of cereals for human and animal consumption. Every year, we rotate the crops grown in each field so that they take different nutrients from the soil and the ground doesn’t become poached and tired.

This year we have grown lots of milling wheat, the type that goes into your bread. It’s all been harvested, rigorously tested to tick all the baker’s requirements, and safely stored in the barns until it’s loaded up and taken to the flour mills.

We grow peas as a spring break crop as they are a legume, and prevent the soil becoming nitrogen deficient. The pea plants have the ability to fix atmospheric nitrogen to form nitrogen compounds that benefit the soil and any future crops. In our case, we grow mushy peas, perfect for having with your fish and chips.

We also grow ‘feed wheat’ that’s used for animal feed and spring barley which we keep to feed our own cattle. The farm is very self-sufficient, and the cattle graze the water meadows in the summer before coming into the barns in the winter and eating our home-produced compounds and silage.

All our crops produce straw as a by product, the stalky bit that’s left after the grains are removed. This is baled up and sent down to Devon to be used as animal bedding, so nothing is wasted, and the whole crop is used.

We’ve already begun thinking about what our 2025 crop rotations will look like, and we’ve got everything crossed for a much kinder winter to make everything a bit easier.

Book Your Stay