ICAD News - Olives in Kent!

Olives in Kent!

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Neil Davy of Huggit's Farm

Going against prevailing wisdom, the owners of Huggit’s Farm in Kent got in touch to let us know that they have planted a commercial olive grove as a result of climate change adaptation. Their ambition is to one day produce British Extra Virgin Olive Oil.

Compared to traditional olive growing regions our northern latitude, long cold winters and relatively short, often wet summers are seen as the antithesis of olive growing territory. Yet, where the grove is planted – on the Isle of Oxney - is one of the warmest and driest parts of Britain. When that is combined with the anticipated rise in temperatures from global warming, the owners think commercially grown olives might just have a fighting chance of success.

After concluding year-long trials of six olive cultivars and various rounds of soil testing and site preparations, three varieties of olive were selected to plant in the 200 tree grove.
The olive varieties were carefully selected from a small group of cultivars thought to have the necessary characteristics and resilience to survive in our southern English climate, and imported from a specialist olive nursery in northern Italy.
All the cultivars have some common traits; their tolerance of cold temperatures, naturally, but also good disease resistance, medium-to-high oil content and distinct flavour characteristics.

Not all the cultivars planted are fully self-fertile, so also planted are reputedly good pollinator among the self-sterile variety. Interspersing the main cropping cultivars with a good cross-pollinator also increases oil yields.

Despite the wettest summer in a century, the planning and careful site preparation seems to be paying off. So far foliage density on the 3-yr old trees has increasing 20-30% since planting and, despite not expecting significant cropping until for another 3 – 5 years, already we have seen a number of trees across the grove bearing fruit.