We wanted to look at food growing on a large scale so where better to go than a visit to our very own Campy Growers. We had a brilliant behind the scenes tour of the site. They have 8 acres to work with on the site of the old council bedding plant nursery. There was a huge amount of removal of old weed suppression fabric and using a Broad fork (see pic where Fatima is modelling the Fork) to break up the compaction prior to planting. Huge poly tunnels were added and low raised beds. No chemicals are used on the site and most of the work is done by volunteers. A huge amount of veg is produced and there is a veg box scheme (sadly it is full up at the time of writing). Plus there is a veg stall every Saturday in Camperdown park in season near the Play park from 11-1pm.
We talked about crop rotation, weed control and slug control amongst other things. We debated which tomatoes tasted best, how tall the beans were! So much to chat about! How about this for sustainable slug control? The slugs at Campy are collected up from under old compost bags every day and taken off site. They are attracted to the cool, damp ground below the plastic compost bags overnight. (see pic) A big challenge this year!
