Big Berta In Action

Sprucing up the Garden

Jacob putting our flail mower ‘big Berta’ through its paces

With the busy day-to-day rhythm of running a market garden, although we do our best to keep everything looking beautiful, we especially welcome the opportunity every six weeks or so during the growing season to really tidy the site and prepare it for the small social events we hold periodically and particularly our Open Day each summer.

This week we are hosting a Pizza and Preparations evening, where a small band of us gather to stir our biodynamic preparations and spray them on the land. Many hands make light work of both the stirring task—which takes a full hour—and the job of spraying every corner of the garden. To help things along, we fire up the pizza oven and get baking, turning the work into a special social occasion as well.

The particular preparation we are spraying this week is made from cow manure that has been buried in the ground inside a cow horn for six months, from October through to March. The resulting fermented and composted manure becomes especially rich in beneficial bacteria and fungi and, when stirred in water and sprayed on the land, acts as an inoculant for the soil, promoting healthy and vigorous crop growth. Strange as the practice may seem, there is actually a growing body of mainstream scientific research supporting its effectiveness.

As part of the tidying and beautifying process before the events, alongside plenty of weeding of course, we also get to use “Big Berta” — the magnificent flail mower purchased with funds raised by our Friends of MVMG. It makes wonderful work of mowing the green manures we grow, as you can see in the picture above. We will also be making good use of our new pergola (pictured below right), another addition made possible through generous donations from two very kind Friends.

We are unable to host large numbers at our Pizza and Preparations evenings, but if you have a particular interest in biodynamics and would like to learn more, do get in touch and we can let you know about future events. Everyone is invited to this year’s Open Day, of course. The date is yet to be confirmed, though it will most likely be in September. We will certainly keep you posted on that one.

Pippa weeding the chards and beetroots and our new pergola (right)