The majority of kale you buy in UK supermarkets between June and March will have been grown by farmers in Lincolnshire. One farmer who has many years of experience growing brassicas such as kale is Alan Bell. Alan and his team plant around 60 hectares of kale every year to supply much of the country with the nutritionally rich vegetable. Alan buys the seed from top quality suppliers. He then hands them to a local plant raiser who takes over the initial process of growing the tiny plants in a commercial scale glasshouse.
Once they are strong enough, a team of people plant out the kale in rows at Hall Farm in Fosdyke, Lincolnshire. While this task is aided by machinery, it requires people to select the strongest plants and insert them one by one into a semi-automated planter which puts them into the ground.
The first kale of the year is planted at the beginning of April, and in order to provide a consistent supply of fresh young produce, sequential plantings are made through until August. The earlier crops are covered with fleece to speed up the growing process.
It takes a team of seven to maintain the crop and ensure that weeds are kept to a minimum as it is important to plant health that they are left free-standing.
The kale plants take two to three months to grow depending on the outside temperature. When the plants reach the optimum time for picking, the team harvest the leaves by hand. This means that the quality of produce is kept high as they are able to immediately discard those leaves which are not up to standard, but it also means that the plant is able to produce a second crop of harvestable leaves. Kale is one of the few vegetable plants that can be harvested more than once.
As the team strip the leaves from the plant, they are followed by a tractor fitted with a conveyer belt designed to transport the kale into a covered trailer or rig. A separate team work inside the rig sorting through the leaves and putting them into plastic containers ready to be taken back to the factory for cutting and washing.
In order to ensure that the vegetable reaches the supermarkets as fresh as possible, they start work in the fields harvesting from around 6.30am or when the light allows. They will gather around 1.5 tonnes of kale in approximately four hours.
The kale is thoroughly washed using a “state-of-the-art” stainless steel automatic washing facility. It is immersed in running water for a full 90 seconds. The water is mixed with a natural fruit acid rather than using chemical based substances. There is minimal human intervention during the washing and packing process and where it is necessary is done in high care surroundings. Another important job staff undertake is cleaning the equipment at the end of the day - a task which takes eight hours!
Once the kale has been harvested and washed, it is cut and packaged ready to be transported to supermarkets around the country. The aim is for the kale to be harvested, packed and despatched within 24 hours so that customers receive the freshest possible product.
The soil at Hall Farm is cultivated during the winter months in order to maintain good condition. The kale crop is grown in a mixed farming rotation, kale is grown in the same field once every six years. Other crops in the rotation include potatoes, leeks and peas. This wide rotation reduces pest and disease carry over, which maximises the quality of the crops.
Kale is particularly successful in Lincolnshire as the farms there have the benefit of some of the best soil in the country. It is extremely moisture retentive and mineral rich as much of the land around the Wash is reclaimed from the sea. This means that once the crop is established it is more likely to remain healthy even in extended dry periods. The large root structure of the kale plant also helps to keep it strong and makes irrigation unnecessary.
Alan grows 60 hectares of kale at his farm in Lincolnshire. He grows significantly more than his buyers demand in order to maintain a constant and reliable supply, allowing for a certain amount of crop failure.
“If the whole crop was perfect quality we would have grown twice as much as we needed!” Alan said. “But every year is different and brings a new set of challenges. As growers we have to ensure we offer our customers a constant and reliable supply, so we consciously grow more than we have sales for to ensure we never let our customer down on quality or availability.”
Alan is keen to get more people trying kale, pointing out that while many of us are beginning to eat kale again, there are still plenty of people who need to discover kale with its “superfood” qualities, great taste and versatility.
“Kale is a great tasting vegetable and more and more people are beginning to eat it regularly because they recognise that it’s really healthy and easy to use,” he said. “I would recommend it to anyone who hasn’t tried it!”
