Ale Farm

Our new orchard, planted only four months ago, is bearing fruit!  We really didn't expect this.  It's a baby Discovery apple.  We've seen apples forming on the matron cooking apple tree (below) but this one is extra special.  The 23 new trees (apple, pear, plum, cherry and cobnut) are only very small but they're doing well. We were able to plant our orchard due to a grant from the Trees Outside Woodland scheme.

 We spent a creative weekend practicing with glazes and enjoying a Raku pottery firing.  Raku is a low-firing pottery technique involving reduction and thermal shock. We started by glazing existing biscuit fired pottery.  It was then was put into a kiln just to dry.   From there the pottery went into two kilns for firing.  After they were 'cooked' they were taken out and immediately put into tins of sawdust with the lids put quickly on the tins.  The resulting smoke got into all the cracks in the glazes and the resulting colours were very impressive. We were all surprised and pleased with the results.  The whole session was led by Mike Childs, a highly experienced local potter, and it took place between two of our barns, sheltered from the wind.  We plan to have another Raku firing before the end of the summer.