Seed saving on Tuesday gave us the chance to see how much effort goes in to keeping varieties going. This is a small operation - two full time and one part time people working there - and fascinating to see. They have a couple of plots of land, each with a poly tunnel or two (the plots are far enough apart so different varieties can be grown without the risk of cross polination), a little woodland, and a converted milking shed. At the time of writing there are only two commercial seed producers in the whole of Ireland!
We got to help getting beans from their pods, and later tried to help in removing radish seeds from their husks by dancing on top of them...! We also did "the usual" - a little weeding, a lot of chatting, and plenty of tea drinking!
On Wednesday? Wow. The Hollies is a beautiful 28 acre plot. There are 9 adults living there, one family in the original farmhouse, one in a completed cob house, one in an annexe and one in a wooden cabin built in about 23 weeks, mostly single handed!
There are lots of cob buildings - they hold a number of cob courses there, the longest being a 10 week apprenticeship, which goes into all aspects of cob building at great depth - not limited just to the cob, but roofing, design, and so on. And the cob buildings are beautiful! Curvy, sculpted, organic.
Most of the timber and firewood used is sourced locally; they have composting toilets, a yurt, and cob pizza oven; coppice land growing away merrily. And it feels peaceful, grounded, and just generally lovely!They even had grapes - almost, almost ripe - growing in one poly tunnel. Big, healthy (tasty - almost!!) bunches of grapes.
Homemade wine, anyone?
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