“they’re tricky little people”

Nestled in the idyllic Vale of Belvoir in Leicestershire behind wild, rich hedgerows lies Belvoir Farm – pronounced ‘Beaver’, which originates from 1066 when indigenous English speakers struggled to pronounce the French spelling. At 60 acres, their organic elder ower plantation is the largest in the UK. Fruit & Vine reporter Anna Louise chatted with owner Peverel Manners, alongside farm manager Keith Challen, at the start of their elder ower harvest

Peverel is the current owner of Belvoir Farm in Nottingham, taking over from his mother Mary Manners and his father John Manners, who started farming the land in the 1950s.

Unsurprisingly, the farm was originally used for dairy farming (like most in the Leicestershire area) but John gradually made the transition to arable due to the drive to grow more food after the Second World War. He bought a D8 Caterpillar cultivator with a very primitive sub-soiler to start getting air into the heavy land.

Alongside growing wheat, maize and barley, John also had a big turkey farm on the land in the early 1960s – interestingly, he was bigger than Bernard Matthews until fowl pest wiped out his entire ock. Pev recalls early childhood memories of ladies plucking turkeys by hand in the sheds that were later used for infusing elder ower.

Pev is proud that the family farm works in support of the wildlife and nature that resides there, alongside crafting their range of natural fruit drinks. Their elder ower cordial, found on the

The elds of elder sit amongst the idyllic Vale of Belvoir, with the backdrop of the famous ‘faux historic’ castle and stately home shelves of all major supermarkets, is made using a secret 40-year-old family recipe.

A family recipe

The drinks business started as a diversi cation on the Manners’ family farm. It all began in their farmhouse kitchen when Mary started experimenting with her own homemade elder ower cordial in a bucket on the kitchen table.

The mixture, decanted into an assortment of recycled plastic and glass bottles, soon became highly sought-after amongst friends, family and the local church. As the drink started to become increasingly popular, John suggested that they try to sell the cordial. In the beginning, John would sell it from the back of his old car to the local delicatessens and farm shops. It was well-received and in high demand, so the following year they made 50% more.

Gradually they moved from making the cordial recipe in buckets, to big plastic tubs, and then cheese vats.

It’s the start of harvest, so around 5% of the elders are owering. As the weeks progress, that will change rapidly

Pev checks on the youngest elder trees on the farm – they’re just three years old compared to others that have been owering for 35 years

Before they knew it, they were using ve cheese vats a year and then ve cheese vats a day. Now, they have ve 18,000 litre vats in the factory on the farm – and they ll those every day during the harvest season.

A closely guarded secret

At Belvoir Farm, they plant one single variety of elder – and only three employees at the farm know the name of the variety they grow; they don’t tell anyone.

They’ve done intensive research into the di erent varieties of elders, working out which would have the most owers and be the easiest to pick. It’s no surprise when Pev says the cordial recipe is also a secret. He explains that alongside the fresh elder owers, it’s all made from natural, kitchen cabinet ingredients.

They don’t use any preservatives, additives, sweeteners or emulsi ers – and it’s very high in owers. Pev exclaims that it’s not just the recipe that has remained the same, but also the way in which it’s made, just on a larger scale. The freshly harvested elder owers are still hand-stirred into the vats, on the same day they are picked. He laughs, saying it’s hysterical and slightly mad!

Despite the expense, Pev decided to keep his mother’s ower-rich recipe unchanged, even though competitors in the industry have reduced their ingredients to save money. Pev hopes customers will continue to want to pay for an authentic taste, full of strong oral scents.

Elder ower characteristics

They’re a di cult plant to grow according to both Pev and Keith. They don’t want to anthropomorphise; but they enjoy explaining that the plants have tricky personalities.

Elder trees are a woodland glade plant that like their own patch of skylight. They want to be near to other trees but not next to them and they’re very di cult to manage as they’ll try to kill other elder trees that grow too close by. They do, however, manage to grow next to blackthorn, which they tolerate.

Because of this, they’re lovingly nicknamed ‘divas’ on the farm. Keith admits he’s got a love/hate relationship with them, because when it goes well, it’s fascinating and the plants reward him.

Soil solutions

Interestingly, the soil at Belvoir Farm is completely wrong for growing elders. The ‘tricky tree’ needs free-draining, brashy soil with frequent rainfall. However, the Belvoir Vale has some of the heaviest clay soils in the country and even Europe. Some areas on the farm are almost 97% clay which is totally unsuitable, so the team are very careful to locate the lightest patches of soil around the farm.

Before planting, they dig farmyard, organic manure into the beds to improve the soil health and create a nutritious environment in which to grow. They soil test every year, not just testing for the basics – nitrogen, phosphates and potashes – but also for all minor elements, trace elements and for organic matter, to see how much they are improving the soils.

Historically, the land was worked quite deeply so they now work shallow and wide, helping to achieve a much lower fuel usage in comparison to decades ago.

Keith says he had a steep learning curve when he rst joined the farm 13 years ago – knowing a lot about growing combinable crops, but nothing about elder owers. He’s really enjoying the challenge of farming on some of the heaviest land in the country, despite knowing it wasn’t going to be easy.

He uses 5,000 tonnes of manure across 2,500 acres every year, which creates a much better soil structure. In the elds where Keith applies large amounts of manure, they notice a signi cant yield uplift.

They trade their straw for manure, working together with their neighbours who share a similar vision.

Welcoming wildlife

Pev and Keith explain that their love for the environment is their reason for farming. They plant pockets of the land with pollen and nectar mixes from seed merchants just for the birds, butter ies and the bees.

They have three beehives tucked behind the elds of elder trees, and they allow scru y headlands and borders to grow unruly for wildlife, framing their wheat and barley elds.

Whilst it might look wild and uncontrolled, the planting has been planned carefully. These designated areas are rich with environmental crops so that small birds can feed all through the winter on proteins and oils.

Keith and Pev distribute over 10 tonnes of bird feed a year across tracks and bird feeders on the farm. Four years ago, they planted 2,500 trees to create a deciduous, broad leaf woodland, and they now plant hedgerows every year.

The long grass left between elder trees is alive with hares, voles, mice and the owls that feed on them. They leave wildlife corridors in every eld so they can move freely about the farm. Keith re ects on his early mornings at the farm, explaining that there’s no better feeling at 6.30am, than venturing down the farm track and watching the fallow deer ahead.

The farm is home to a huge variety of deer –red, roe, fallow and muntjac. They can often be spotted amongst the 80 acres of willow trees that the farm grows for biomass boiler fuel. Pev says that the willow doesn’t make much money, but they continue because it makes for a fantastic environmental habitat – and it doesn’t cost much to grow.

Both Keith and Pev watched deer born underneath the branches last year and they compare the scene to something from a lm. Pev mentions the high numbers of brown hares that they have on the farm – and his joy in noticing the increase in rabbit numbers after the outbreaks of VHD and myxomatosis in the area.

Belvoir Farm has also just entered a project with an ornithological group who have reported seeing an increase in population of all birds again on the farm since the avian u outbreak. Keith is proud to point out that they have the largest number of resident yellow hammers on any farm in the East Midlands.

Managing extreme heatwaves

Pev re ects on the 40ºC heatwave that the farm recorded last summer; they didn’t see much of a drop in elder ower yield, but they did notice smaller owers.

They think this year a heatwave would be even worse because of the wet winter and early spring; Keith explains that the crops haven’t got the root mass that they would ordinarily have, so the plant architecture isn’t set up to cope well with the drought.

They’ve put in a few measures to try and help keep the roots moist. As part of their environmental stewardship scheme, they ‘cut and lay’ hedging; a traditional method to thicken up hedgerows. They take the brash that comes from the process and put it through a wood-chipping machine, including any other foliage from forestry clearing on the farm. The woodchip then locks in the moisture and stops them drying out in the droughts.

Harvest time

Harvest is the usual chaos, Pev exclaims, already being two days into the season. The elder owers are picked by the local community and processed on the same day in the factory on the farm. Their labour force is entirely local, gathered through advertising in the local press, on local radio and by lea et dropping. This year, within the rst two days, they’ve already had over a tonne of owers brought in – a huge volume, as elder owers are so light, Keith explains.

They recognise familiar faces who have returned each year for decades. Prior to Brexit, they relied heavily on European workers. Keith remembers the moment when half of the Romanian army turned up to work the harvest one year and he was overwhelmed by their phenomenal work ethic. The soldiers were very entrepreneurial, using the money they’d earnt to buy car and motorbike parts to then sell at a greater pro t back in Romania.

The thought of losing these workers, and others like them, caused fear and worry for the farm initially, as they’d always relied on a European workforce for harvest. Through word-of-mouth and local marketing, Pev and Keith have managed to build a local labour force with just as many numbers; it can be as many as 200 pickers each year, often with cars queuing up at the gates.

Hopes for the future

Belvoir Farm is already a fully sustainable production with a zero-waste land ll site. In good weather they’re almost fully powered by sunshine and on a cloudy day, they’re 60% solar-powered by 400kW of solar panels spanning 150 metres across the top of their farm buildings and factory roofs. It cost Pev around £400,000 to put the system in place.

Every bottle – and all of the packaging – is recycled and certi ed gold-standard. Even the waste liquid goes to an anaerobic digestion plant, to be put in the mixture for power generation.

At the moment they are powered by Calor gas, as it’s more sustainable than diesel, but they’re looking into hydrogen boilers as the next step, as well as windmills, to get to the point where their electricity is 100% sustainably sourced.

They want to hand the farm back in a better condition than when they started farming in the 50s and in uence the countryside for the better.

Belvoir Farm

Location: Vale of Belvoir, Nottingham

Farm size: 2,700 acres for wheat, barley, eld beans and pasture, plus occasionally oilseed rape; 100 acres for wildlife habitat; and 60 acres for organic elder owers

Soil type: Heavy clay

Aspect: The 60 acres of elder owers are dotted about the farm in ve locations. They’re found within their smaller elds and sometimes in corners of the farm. They’re situated in areas that are sheltered from wind – and that have lighter soil where possible Age of trees: They range between 35 years and four years old

Varieties: Top secret

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