Market Gardening
Market gardening in the Tamar Valley existed in Victorian times alongside mining, quarrying, brickmaking and fishing. As the fishing was seasonal, market gardening provided an income for the rest of the year. Plymouth and the navy were supplied with fruit and vegetables.
Despite the smoke and fumes caused by the increased industrialisation in the mid 1800s, there was a rapid expansion in market gardening due to the influx of miners and other workers into the area. Apples, pears, cherries, strawberries and tomatoes were grown as well as daffodils, irises and anemones. This provided a succession of crops throughout the year.
Gradually markets further afield were sought including London and markets in the north. The biggest breakthrough was the arrival of the railway in Plymouth in 1849, then the East Cornwall Mineral Railway (ECMR) in 1872, followed by its takeover by the Plymouth, Devonport and South Western Junction Railway (PDSWR).
Despite the smoke and fumes caused by the increased industrialisation in the mid 1800s, there was a rapid expansion in market gardening due to the influx of miners and other workers into the area. Apples, pears, cherries, strawberries and tomatoes were grown as well as daffodils, irises and anemones. This provided a succession of crops throughout the year.
Gradually markets further afield were sought including London and markets in the north. The biggest breakthrough was the arrival of the railway in Plymouth in 1849, then the East Cornwall Mineral Railway (ECMR) in 1872, followed by its takeover by the Plymouth, Devonport and South Western Junction Railway (PDSWR).
Victoria County History Cornwall - Volume One (1906) (from 'Industries - Horticulture' - article by Rev. Thomas Taylor )
In East Cornwall fruit-growing has assumed considerable dimension, and now ranks amongst its most profitable industries. To a successful and well-known horticulturist (Mr. J.W. LAWREY, J.P., C.C. of Calstock) to whose enterprise the district owes much of its present prosperity, the writer is indebted for the following account of the industry.
The district in which cherries (mazzards), strawberries, and rasberries are largely grown comprise the land adjoining or within three miles of the Tamar, from Saltash to Horsebridge in Stoke Climsland; and embraces the parishes of St. Stephens by Saltash, Botus Fleming, Pillaton, St. Mellion, Landulph, St. Dominick, Calstock and Stoke Climsland. Of the fruit grown, by far the most important is the strawberry, of which the annual output from the district named is, at present, from 200 to 300 tons. Next in importance is the raspberry, which produces from 100 to 150 tons annually, and realizes on an average about £21 per ton, the cost of gathering amounting to about 25%. At the time of the fruit harvest work is so urgent that very high wages are paid, women and children earning 3s and men 4s per day. It is doubtful if cherry - growing has increased during the last thirty years. The cherry is the most uncertain of fruits, and, unlike other fruit, does not find a ready sale beyond the two Westernmost counties.
In connection with the cultivation of strawberries the punnet-making industry has attained to large dimensions. Almost all the fruit sold for dessert purposes is sent to market in small chip baskets (punnets) containing less than lb each. These are packed in cases which hold 4½ dozen punnets. The demand for these latter is so great as to provide work for all the women and children of the district during the winter months. As the result of the fruit industry the rent of land suitable for the purpose has doubled and in some cases quadrupled in value. Both fruit-growers and labourers have prospered. As regards the latter, the high wages earned by the men, supplemented by the earnings of their wives and children, enable them to live in a way unknown to the ordinary peasant. A beginning has also been made in the cultivation of tomatoes under glass, and the results obtained warrant the belief that it will be greatly extended. The effect of the fruit industry generally upon the intelligence of the people is also very marked. Beside educating the faculty of observation, the daily business done with persons at a distance has given the inhabitants a wider outlook than that possessed by those who only trade with their neighbours, so that, in every way, fruit-growing has proved a blessing to the entire district.
In East Cornwall fruit-growing has assumed considerable dimension, and now ranks amongst its most profitable industries. To a successful and well-known horticulturist (Mr. J.W. LAWREY, J.P., C.C. of Calstock) to whose enterprise the district owes much of its present prosperity, the writer is indebted for the following account of the industry.
The district in which cherries (mazzards), strawberries, and rasberries are largely grown comprise the land adjoining or within three miles of the Tamar, from Saltash to Horsebridge in Stoke Climsland; and embraces the parishes of St. Stephens by Saltash, Botus Fleming, Pillaton, St. Mellion, Landulph, St. Dominick, Calstock and Stoke Climsland. Of the fruit grown, by far the most important is the strawberry, of which the annual output from the district named is, at present, from 200 to 300 tons. Next in importance is the raspberry, which produces from 100 to 150 tons annually, and realizes on an average about £21 per ton, the cost of gathering amounting to about 25%. At the time of the fruit harvest work is so urgent that very high wages are paid, women and children earning 3s and men 4s per day. It is doubtful if cherry - growing has increased during the last thirty years. The cherry is the most uncertain of fruits, and, unlike other fruit, does not find a ready sale beyond the two Westernmost counties.
In connection with the cultivation of strawberries the punnet-making industry has attained to large dimensions. Almost all the fruit sold for dessert purposes is sent to market in small chip baskets (punnets) containing less than lb each. These are packed in cases which hold 4½ dozen punnets. The demand for these latter is so great as to provide work for all the women and children of the district during the winter months. As the result of the fruit industry the rent of land suitable for the purpose has doubled and in some cases quadrupled in value. Both fruit-growers and labourers have prospered. As regards the latter, the high wages earned by the men, supplemented by the earnings of their wives and children, enable them to live in a way unknown to the ordinary peasant. A beginning has also been made in the cultivation of tomatoes under glass, and the results obtained warrant the belief that it will be greatly extended. The effect of the fruit industry generally upon the intelligence of the people is also very marked. Beside educating the faculty of observation, the daily business done with persons at a distance has given the inhabitants a wider outlook than that possessed by those who only trade with their neighbours, so that, in every way, fruit-growing has proved a blessing to the entire district.
The chip basket factory in Calstock was a big employer in the area and women were brought in by bus from the surrounding villages.
The following is an extract of an interview given by Anne Lewis who used to work at the factory.
“Before, it was a basket factory, it was a brickworks. After that finished, around 1920, it became the Chip Basket Factory. It started by share Holders getting the factory on its feet. About that time, the factory employed about 30 women and 12 or more men, from Calstock and also from Bere Alston. Work was very hard at the factory in those days.
Each day before work started a hooter was blown, to start work at 7.30, also at lunch time and again before anyone left work. There was no heat in the factory in those days, and the workers were allowed a few minutes to warm their hands in the kilns and right back to work. Nearly all the wood peeling machines were worked by steam.
The women made 3 lb and 6 lb baskets for raspberries, which had to be lined with grease proof paper and was stitched into all the baskets, before they could be sold, locally, and by rail. The wage at that time was 10 shillings a week, for making 10 gross (144) a day. They only got a pay rise if their work was well done, and best behaviour.
Once they had wood from Russia which was White Popular, but the wood affected the women workers. They all came out in a very bad rash, due to the sap from the wood. So the wood from Russia stopped and in its place, came in another Popular, also Scotch, wood.
The baskets in those days were dried in the kiln which was the tall stack that stood in the factory yard, which was torn down in 1985 due to closure of the factory.
As time went on things got better and more advanced electricity came in, so the machines started to work once more by electricity. Then they started to make punnets for strawberries, also, in 1950's, baskets 4 lbs - 6 lbs - 12 lbs. for tomatoes and mushrooms.
By this time employment increased every machine was working and the factory was full of old and new employees, from Calstock, Gunnislake, Metherell and Bere Alston. The timber was delivered by lorries, in all lengths. This was about 1956.— the wood was cut by saws and rolled down a chute to the main peeling machines. From there the wood was put on the peeling machines and the bark was taken off, and then the whole log was peeled thin enough to go to make all baskets. Different machines were used to cut the sides, rims and wood cut to size, to plait the bottom of the baskets. Then the workers had to plait, rim and turn in the baskets by the machines. The metal handles were riveted on by other workers.
The baskets then went into a very large drying chamber to dry. They had to be stacked - everyone separate - to dry, and the doors closed over night. The next day they were taken down from the chamber and bundled and tied ready for the lorries to collect. A lot mainly went to Wisbech and some were sold locally.” If the weather was nice, baskets would be put outside in the sun.
The Daffodil 'Boom' Years
Disease problems started to hit the intensively grown strawberry crops and growers increasingly put more of their land into daffodil growing. The flower season started in early February and extended through to May which was the month of the unique and valuable 'Tamar Double Whites'. Other important varieties that were grown in the early days included 'Bath's Flame', 'Emperor', 'King Alfred', 'Horace' and many 'pheasant eye' type daffodils.
Flower picking and bunching is labour intensive work and the whole family and extra workers would be needed in the flower season. The flower tying or bunching was (and still is!) traditionally 'women's work'. The open flowers were tied with raffia into bunches of 12 and around 24 bunches were then carefully packed into wooden boxes ready to be taken to the station.
All around the 'gardens' in the Tamar Valley there were 'galvanised' packing and tying sheds with south facing windows at the front. In the early days the daffodils were sent off with the flowers fully open so the sheds were light and warm to encourage buds to open. Some growers heated the sheds or took flowers into their kitchens to get them to the right stage to pack.
Daffodil growing was a labour intensive job with little machinery being available or suitable to use on the steep slopes that they were usually grown on. Preparing the ground, planting the bulbs, picking flowers and lifting the bulbs was all carried out using basic hand tools, but it was worth while as labour was cheap and business was good. Salesmen from Holland sold the growers new improved varieties of daffodils such as 'Actaea', which had improved yields and extended the season.
The following is an extract from a document we hold in the archive. Unfortunately we don’t have a date or provenance, but it gives a short insight into daffodil growing in the last century.
Daffodil Growing In The Tamar Valley
The Decline in the Tamar Valley's Bulb Industry
Daffodil growing and market gardening in general, started to decline dramatically in the Tamar Valley in the 1960s. There were many reasons for this, but perhaps the most influential change was the closure of branch lines on the local railway network and the reduction of remaining services from Plymouth which meant that the flowers could no longer reach 'up country' markets on time.
Competition from growers with large areas of glass in the East of England and the start of flower imports from abroad, also made daffodil growing less viable here. The advantage of our early season had been lost. Our steep sloping 'gardens' could not be cultivated using modern machinery, making it difficult to keep up with the trend for flower growers to also regularly lift bulbs to sell. It. became difficult to find the cheap, seasonal labour that was required here and young local people were tempted away from the family market gardens, by more lucrative professions elsewhere.
Today there are very few daffodil growers remaining in the Tamar Valley; most have diversified into other types of farming to keep the business viable or have smallholdings and sell only a few flowers at local shops or on stalls outside their houses. Some larger growers nearby have large acreages of daffodils, but these are primarily grown to be lifted and sold wholesale to 'up country' bulb merchants. The flowers are picked before there is any colour in the bud and may be sent as far away as America. Van loads of cheap labourers are brought in to pick the flowers, which benefits the local economy very little.
Today we are left with lovely reminders of a once thriving industry that can be seen flowering in our hedges and the woods that are rapidly recolonizing the steep slopes of the old 'gardens'. Even if daffodil growing completely stops in the Tamar Valley, each spring our landscape will remind us of it's past importance.
Daffodil Growing In The Tamar Valley
The Decline in the Tamar Valley's Bulb Industry
Daffodil growing and market gardening in general, started to decline dramatically in the Tamar Valley in the 1960s. There were many reasons for this, but perhaps the most influential change was the closure of branch lines on the local railway network and the reduction of remaining services from Plymouth which meant that the flowers could no longer reach 'up country' markets on time.
Competition from growers with large areas of glass in the East of England and the start of flower imports from abroad, also made daffodil growing less viable here. The advantage of our early season had been lost. Our steep sloping 'gardens' could not be cultivated using modern machinery, making it difficult to keep up with the trend for flower growers to also regularly lift bulbs to sell. It. became difficult to find the cheap, seasonal labour that was required here and young local people were tempted away from the family market gardens, by more lucrative professions elsewhere.
Today there are very few daffodil growers remaining in the Tamar Valley; most have diversified into other types of farming to keep the business viable or have smallholdings and sell only a few flowers at local shops or on stalls outside their houses. Some larger growers nearby have large acreages of daffodils, but these are primarily grown to be lifted and sold wholesale to 'up country' bulb merchants. The flowers are picked before there is any colour in the bud and may be sent as far away as America. Van loads of cheap labourers are brought in to pick the flowers, which benefits the local economy very little.
Today we are left with lovely reminders of a once thriving industry that can be seen flowering in our hedges and the woods that are rapidly recolonizing the steep slopes of the old 'gardens'. Even if daffodil growing completely stops in the Tamar Valley, each spring our landscape will remind us of it's past importance.
Local Support Industries
Local businesses connected with market gardening started up. There was a busy ' strawberry chip basket' factory at Calstock that also made boxes and wicker baskets used for the flowers. Mr Fred Rogers started his successful Horticultural Merchants business in St. Dominic which began making wooden flower and fruit boxes. This company also transported produce to Saltash Station, starting with horse drawn wagons and later, a fleet of lorries, as business grew.
In the 1920s daffodils had become a very important crop in the area and the newer varieties were intensively grown and more prone to disease. Eelworm was the main problem and Fred Rogers, very enterprisingly, set up a hot water sterilisation plant that local growers brought their bulbs to for treatment. The bulbs were lifted in summer and immersed in the hot water tank at 110ºF for 3 hours and this killed eelworm and narcissus fly.
Local businesses connected with market gardening started up. There was a busy ' strawberry chip basket' factory at Calstock that also made boxes and wicker baskets used for the flowers. Mr Fred Rogers started his successful Horticultural Merchants business in St. Dominic which began making wooden flower and fruit boxes. This company also transported produce to Saltash Station, starting with horse drawn wagons and later, a fleet of lorries, as business grew.
In the 1920s daffodils had become a very important crop in the area and the newer varieties were intensively grown and more prone to disease. Eelworm was the main problem and Fred Rogers, very enterprisingly, set up a hot water sterilisation plant that local growers brought their bulbs to for treatment. The bulbs were lifted in summer and immersed in the hot water tank at 110ºF for 3 hours and this killed eelworm and narcissus fly.
The War
Great changes were seen in the Tamar Valley landscape. Growers were not 'called up 'if they were growing food crops so daffodils were rapidly lifted! They were required to reduce the acreage of flowers by 50% each year and grow fruit and vegetables instead. Not wanting to waste the daffodil bulbs, many were planted into the hedges, (where many pre-war varieties can still be seen today). Even in wartime flowers were still wanted by the markets 'up country' and reduced quantities of flowers were sent (or sometimes taken up by enterprising locals), and could receive very good prices.
Great changes were seen in the Tamar Valley landscape. Growers were not 'called up 'if they were growing food crops so daffodils were rapidly lifted! They were required to reduce the acreage of flowers by 50% each year and grow fruit and vegetables instead. Not wanting to waste the daffodil bulbs, many were planted into the hedges, (where many pre-war varieties can still be seen today). Even in wartime flowers were still wanted by the markets 'up country' and reduced quantities of flowers were sent (or sometimes taken up by enterprising locals), and could receive very good prices.
The Modernisation of the Tamar Valley Daffodil Industry
Soon after the war, machinery became more available and bulbs no longer had to be planted using the old hand tools such as 'dibblers'. Tractors and rotavators came into use and bulbs could now be planted into a ploughed furrow. Later, specially designed machines for planting and harvesting the bulbs became available and all this, along with improved fertilisers and chemicals resulted in much larger acreages of more easily cultivated land being planted with daffodils. Bulbs could now be lifted mechanically after the leaves had died off, which meant they could mature in the ground and attain a good size and the growers started to get an extra income from selling the bulbs themselves. Flowers started to be packed in cardboard boxes and gradually the markets required the flowers to be picked and sent in an increasingly more open condition. (The number of bunches in a box has increased from 24 to 60, in the 'pencil' state that they are picked today).
During the 1950s and 60s an average of 350,000 boxes of flowers and fruit were dispatched on the railways from the area every year. It has been calculated that this was worth around £150,000 to the Tamar Valley growers. At the peak of the daffodil season three special trains on the Callington to Bere Alston branch line carried produce to 'up country' markets each day. In 1955 it was recorded that 1000 people were employed locally, (including part-time workers) in the market gardening industry.
Soon after the war, machinery became more available and bulbs no longer had to be planted using the old hand tools such as 'dibblers'. Tractors and rotavators came into use and bulbs could now be planted into a ploughed furrow. Later, specially designed machines for planting and harvesting the bulbs became available and all this, along with improved fertilisers and chemicals resulted in much larger acreages of more easily cultivated land being planted with daffodils. Bulbs could now be lifted mechanically after the leaves had died off, which meant they could mature in the ground and attain a good size and the growers started to get an extra income from selling the bulbs themselves. Flowers started to be packed in cardboard boxes and gradually the markets required the flowers to be picked and sent in an increasingly more open condition. (The number of bunches in a box has increased from 24 to 60, in the 'pencil' state that they are picked today).
During the 1950s and 60s an average of 350,000 boxes of flowers and fruit were dispatched on the railways from the area every year. It has been calculated that this was worth around £150,000 to the Tamar Valley growers. At the peak of the daffodil season three special trains on the Callington to Bere Alston branch line carried produce to 'up country' markets each day. In 1955 it was recorded that 1000 people were employed locally, (including part-time workers) in the market gardening industry.
