About Us

Orchards were first planted at Hill Farm in the 1950's. In those days there were many varieties of both top fruit and soft fruit. Throughout the 1970’s and 80’s the farm was well known for Pick Your Own and its farm shop. There were many occasions when the police were needed to control the influx of visitors attracted in particular by the cherry orchards. With the changes in consumer habits brought by the development of the supermarkets, the numbers of visitors faded and the business has adapted meet the modern fruit market place.

The main elements of our business are growing, storage and the packhouse. These are described in more detail below.

There are also more details on our accreditations and the awards we have received.

Growing

Today we grow the finest apples and pears in Hampshire's beautiful Meon Valley, within the boundaries of the new South Downs National Park.

In recent years we have invested in greater productivity from our orchards through new intensive planting systems. The “table top” system utilises posts and wire and is similar to the growing systems seen in vineyards. This has allowed us to dramatically increase the yields available from our trees.

The varieties we grow include English staples such as Cox's Orange Pippin and Bramley's Seedling, as well as more modern varieties including Braeburn, Gala and, more recently, Kanzi, a hybrid grown under licence.

Apples	Pears
Braeburn	Comice
Bramley's Seedling	Conference
Cox
Discovery
Egremont Russet
Gala
Kanzi
Spartan
Worcester

Storage

Our first cold stores were installed nearly 30 years ago and have been progressively updated since. There is capacity for some 600 tonnes of fruit which can be held in store for several months.

Our new, state-of-the-art cold storage facility was opened during the 2008/09 season. This comprises 12 Controlled Atmosphere rooms and a chilled room, allowing us to store approximately 1,800 tonnes of fruit.

Packing

The packhouse replaced the farm shop when the latter was deemed to be unviable in the early 1990's. It is equipped with a Greefa grading system that is capable of sorting the fruit based on size and colour.

Accreditations and Awards

The farm is regularly audited and we have accreditations under the BRC Global Food Standards scheme, Tesco Nature's Choice and Assured Produce (Member Number 4474).

Over the years the farm has won many awards for its fruit at the National Fruit Show, organised annually by the Marden Fruit Show Society.