Pick your own fruit farms are a great way of getting high quality produce straight from the farm or small holding.

Known in some areas by the abbreviation PYO, pick your own farms can be found in many areas around the country.

As with all plants some will grow better in some areas than in others. Strawberries are available in most areas however, the season is quite short, only a few weeks in some places depending on the weather and varieties grown.

You can buy a small punnet or many kilos

Seasonal food

With the credit crunch really starting to bite and prices set to rise, gathering food when in season and storing it is one great way to save money.

Soft fruit, strawberries, raspberries and gooseberries can be turned in to jam, added to pickles or even made into wine or cordials.

Blackcurrants can be easily frozen and made into great vitamin filled crumbles and puddings during the winter.  Nothing quite beats a blast of summer in the depths of a British winter.

Lowering transport miles

Using your local allotment or small holding as a source for fresh produce can also reduce those transport miles.

What could be fresher than a strawberry picked on your way home eaten that evening with some fresh cream or ice-cream.

Thirty minutes spent on a farm getting some green exercise and fresh produce has to be better than trudging around a brightly lit superstore buying fruit and vegetables often carried hundreds of miles.

Approximate prices for Pick your own fruit

Prices for produce will vary throughout the season and depending on your location.  However, great savings can be made over the shelf price in your local supermarket.

• Blackberries, blackcurrants £4 per kg
• Strawberries £4 kg
• Apples £1.25 kg
• Cherries and raspberries £6 kg
• Plums £2.50 pe kg

PYO – vegetables

Lines of strawberry plants in a field

In the last few years pick your own vegetable farms have started to appear. Often running alongside a summer fruit operation, these farms extend the season for operators into early winter.

Common vegetables available include beetroot, broad beans, broccoli, cabbages, carrots, courgettes, spinach and potatoes.

Many farms and outlets are members of FARMA – the National Farmers’ Retail and Markets Association.

FARMA works throughout the UK and is the largest organisation of its type in the world, representing direct sales to customers through farm shops, Pick-Your-Own, farmers’ markets, home delivery, on-farm catering, and farm entertainment.

Approximate prices for Pick your own (PYO) vegetables

• Broad beans £2 per kg
• French Beans £3.80 per kg
• Kohl Rabi £2 per kg
• Potatoes 60p per kg

Pick your own flowers

This is a new concept in the UK, however seems to be very popular in other countries around the globe.  Some farmers are choosing to pre-pick flowers and make them available for you to choose your own bunch whilst others are allowing you to go in to the fields and pick your own. Charging is made for the bunch or per flower stem.

Your local Pick your Own farm

Let us know about your local farm or outlet via the comments box below.

As June approaches, thoughts turn to ripening fruits and for many, who do not have the space or time to grow their own, the “pick your own” fruit farm is the ideal place to be.

Most soft fruit in the supermarket is sold at a premium and although a small tray of raspberries may be nice with a bowl of ice cream it would certainly be uneconomical to buy enough to make jams and pies.

Fruit farms offer people the chance to pick fruit fresh and harvest as little or as much as they like, priced by the punnet or by weight.

Strawberries, the Wimbledon favourite

Strawberries are the first to come into season in June, famously served up as a treat to the fans at Wimbledon. Gooseberries along with red, black and white currants follow close behind, some ready as early as late June.

Raspberries and their hybrids are available from late June to September and sometimes October if the weather is kind.

Picking your own is also great exercise, quite a distance can be covered during a fruit picking session and the bending and reaching uses most of the major muscle groups.  In a half hour session upward of 200 calories can be expended and even if you eat the produce on the way round (many places allow this), it’s only fruit, perfectly healthy and part of your “Five a Day”.

Rhubarb may also be available

Even if you don’t wish to make jams and pies, fruit freezes exceptionally well and a handful of frozen fruit mixed with fruit juice and maybe a little yoghurt can be easily blended to make a great smoothie.

Blackcurrants are high in anti-oxidants

Many of the vitamins that humans require are found in soft fruit, generally, the darker the fruit, the higher the level of anti-oxidants. Picking fruit outdoors will also boost your vitamin D levels, as this vitally important vitamin can only be manufactured in the presence of sunlight (but carefully does it) 10 -15 minutes exposure of face and arms will be enough, always have something you can cover up with so that you do not burn.

Beans are best fresh

You may even find places offering pick your own vegetables. Popular  are peas beans, which lose their vitamins quickly if picked and packed for the supermarket, but are much healthier picked and eaten the same day and if frozen as soon as possible after picking they have been found to retain their freshly picked vitamin content.

So find your nearest growers and go picking!

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