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Clive’s Fruit Farm
As a pioneer of Pick Your Own, Clive’s Fruit Farm is one of the biggest PYO destinations in the area. With a busy calendar of fruit-picking and plenty of onsite activities, it makes for a great day out, especially during the autumn months…
When did you become a PYO farm?
Charlie’s father, Felix, fought at Pegasus Bridge during WWII and returned to this country with new ideas from the Continent. He was a pioneer of Pick Your Own in the 1960s and the innovation is still very much evident today.
Now we also have a fantastic farmshop and butchery stocking vegetables from Evesham and deli products from Worcestershire. We also make our famous farmhouse Scotch Eggs using sausage meat and free range eggs from our own chickens. Visitors can also enjoy coffee and lunches in our coffee shop followed by ice cream in Clive’s Ice Cream parlour!
What is available at the fruit farm?
The farm shop is open all year round and fruit can be picked during spring, summer and autumn. In fact, the autumn fruit is ready at the moment.
Ready picked fruits and vegetables are available straight from our farm fresh or frozen. When in season we always have a selection of varieties of freshly picked strawberries, raspberries and other soft fruits with samples so you can try before you buy. When our own fruits and vegetables are out of season our policy is to buy as locally as possible and as fresh as possible to give a traceable fresh product of excellent quality.
Tell us about your PYO options this autumn?
Plums: The heart and soul of the Worcestershire fruit industry used to be plums, at Clive’s we strive to maintain this. As other growers grub up plums we endeavour to plant more and new varieties.
Our plum season runs from July through to September. We grow: Victoria, Heron, Swan, Opal, Valor, Jubilee, Jubilee, Monarch, Edda, Herman, Blue Tit, Jojo, Seneca, Haganta, Yellow Egg, Burbank, Prolific, Purple Pershore and Damsons. We have just planted some newer varieties including Ferbleur and Meritare.
Apples: The apple harvest begins in mid-August with Discovery. PYO apples then carry on until October.
We grow Discovery, Worcester, Egremont Russet, Herefordshire Russet, Red Windsor, Cox, Queen Cox, Vistabella, Royal Gala, Gala Must, Howgate Wonder, Bramley, Scrumptious, Katy, Spartan, Crispin, Jonagored, Ida Red, Falstaff, Braeburn, Honeycrisp, Pinova, Ashmead’s Kernel, Kidd’s Orange Red, Pink Lady, Jonathan, Golden Delicious and Grenadier.
Most of the above are available for PYO but all are available at some stage in the autumn and winter months in the shop
Pears: The last fruit in the PYO calendar, the pears, are available to pick Sept-Oct and in the shop until the new year. The main varieties grown are Conference, Comice and Concorde. The lesser known and lesser grown are William Pears (the first pear of the season), Beurre Hardy, Emile d’Heyst, Durondeau, Invincible, Celebration and Sensation.
Pumpkins: starting Saturday 8th October, the pumpkin field will be open for pumpkin picking!
Why did you start to make fruit juice from your fruit?
In the late 90s Charlie and Jane had an idea. The English apple and pear market had collapsed and fruit was worth very little per lb. They decided to make apple juice; first sending it across the river to Pershore to be pressed and then making on site. A pack press was purchased in 2001 along with the pasteurisation and bottling equipment. We started with single variety juices to get the basics right then worked our way up to making blended juice. In 2010 we swapped our pack press for a triple roller belt press and our bath pasteurisers for a flash pasteuriser.
How do you make your juice?
We hand pick all our apples and pears which are carefully pressed using the right speed and tension depending on the fruit. We add ascorbic acid (Vitamin C) to help the juice hold its colour. Our products are 100% juice, no added water, chemicals or sugar like most commercial apple juices.
You can also make your own juice here at the farm. If you would you like your apples from your garden turned into your own lovely fruit juice, we can do that for you! Just bring us a minimum of 175kgs of apples and we will press, pasteurise, bottle and package your juice into boxes of 12.
Do you also make cider and perry?
Yes, we make our own Worcestershire Wobblejuice!
The Clives have been making cider on site since they started growing fruit trees. In the old days Mr Clive used to pay his labourers with cider (much to the disgust of the wives!). The cider made on site is mainly a bit of a hobby for us all but we are pleased with the results. Unlike most ciders, the vast majority of the fruit which goes into our cider is dessert or culinary fruit. Occasionally we buy local cider fruit to blend with our own but we aim to keep a traditional farmhouse feel to the whole process. We have a barrel of proper dry farmhouse cider in the shop which you can decant 2,4 or 8 pints from and take away in a bottle. We also do a small amount of fizzed cider and perry. Our perry pears come from a mile up the road from a beautiful age old orchard. To buy cider please see the online shop.
