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Island Seasons
August 2007
Summer should be a time of eating through the garden or allotment crops and endless picnics or days on the beach. It’s not been quite like that this year, but grab the chance when you can and head outdoors.
Our top ten picnic spots are
- Priory Bay
- Brook Down
- Hamstead beach, near Newtown Creek
- Tennyson Down
- St. Catherine’s Down
- The Duver
- Totland Bay
- Culver Cliff
- Steephill Cove
- Luccombe Chine
Most of these places are close enough to a car park for anyone to stroll to, and most can cope with push chairs, although there may be some stiles! Get out your map and find the best routes.
If the weather isn’t quite right for a picnic, why not try the Dino Maze in Niton? It’s a maize (sweetcorn) maze and is open daily 10am-6pm at Niton Manor Farm www.nitonmaze.co.uk
Meet us
We’ll be at Wolverton Manor Garden Fair on 1st and 2nd September and at Arreton Manor Ladies Day on 15th September. Please come along and say ‘hello’ and chat about what you’d like to buy from the Island. We’ll also be doing tastings of Island beer and wine, Paul Murphy’s sausages, mustards, chutneys, jams and cakes! We’ll also be selling some items from the stand and taking orders.
In the fields
Although it came a bit late, harvest is underway and everywhere you can see combines, balers, lorry loads of potatoes and other signs of late summer. You can see fields of sweetcorn all through the Arreton valley, this field is in Merstone. Nothing tastes better fresh than sweetcorn, find it in ‘Pick of the Crop’. We’ll do a round-up of harvest news next month.
Did you know that dairy cows on the Island produce almost 40 million pints of milk each year? Support local farms and buy local milk.
In the hedgerows
We found some huge field mushrooms last week, which were very tasty with butter, parsley and a bit of garlic. If you don’t fancy foraging for food, Robert Groves’ mushrooms are as fresh and tasty as you’ll ever eat – mushrooms with real character! Find them in ‘Pick of the Crop’.
All the rain has left the hedgerows high with plants that are still thriving, rather than parched and dry. We saw these beautiful rosebay willowherb and foxgloves in Parkhurst Forest, busy with bees and butterflies.
