The English Olive Press; July ‘26
Wow, what a scorcher! June brought a small amount of rainfall at the start of month, but the second half then gave us record breaking temperatures (37.9C)! The English Olive Co’s olive grove gave us signs of possible fruiting potential as the flowers opened and then started to turn into baby olives. It has been a busy month including visitors from Nottingham Uni, the English Mustard Growers, The Agricultural Society and also Layla from BBC Food Programme and Harry from BBC Look North News!
A big welcome to all our new subscribers and hello to you all from the July edition of the English Olive Club Newsletter, sharing some of the highlights and what we have been up to in June.
What a busy month it has been in the grove! Apart from the first week of the month, then we have been drip irrigating the olives every week, putting on about 15mm of water. This has helped maintain the trees growth as stress free as possible, as they go into the crucial period of flowering to fruiting, and we aim to maximise fruit set. The weeds are still growing and so are the sucker shoots at the bottom of the trees, so in the cooler temperatures of the early morning hours then weeding and trimming has been taking place. With the trees growing well during this warmer recent spell it is so exciting to see the beautiful small flowers appear at the start of the month, and then some of the trees even showing us baby olives at the end of the month.
The wildlife, in particular the pollinators, have been plentiful which is lovely to see, and I have no doubt that our olive grove bee’s have been in full production mode too.
Most of the trees are now mid to late flowering, but some are now showing us the first signs of fruiting potential, with baby olives on the branches!
With the olive grove being insecticide free and fungicide free we are trying to encourage natural predation in the olive grove; encouraging good insects and birds, who will hopefully control the less desirable and unwanted pests and insects. Birds play a great role in keeping caterpillar numbers down for us, and using the Merlin App, then Tina has started to do a check on which birds we have in the olive grove, which we are calling Tina’s Bird Tally! In June Tina’s Bird Tally recorded Eurasian Green Woodpecker, Eurasian Magpie, Common Chaffinch, Eurasian Jackdaw, Eurasian Blackcap, European Robin, Eurasian Blackbird, Common Wood-Pigeon and Eurasian Wren. We will see how bird specie changes through the seasons and also as the olive grove matures.
It has been a busy month with visitors to the The English Olive Co, but one we very much enjoy. We try to tell the story and journey of our olive trees, with the growing timelines involved, some of the growing practises we use, and also the huge array of health benefits that Extra Virgin Olive Oil can give you. Layla Kazim from MasterChef, The BBC Food Programme and many other presenting roles came to see us and The BBC Food Programme podcast will soon be released on The English Olive Co…we await with excited anticipation! Shortly after Leyla’s visit we hosted Nottingham Uni Agric’s as part of their week long Field Tour in East Anglia, and we looked at potato, mustard and pea crops, in addition to the olive grove. They were a great bunch of students with many fantastic questions, and it is also wonderful to see the next generation interested in agriculture, horticulture and farming. We also held the summer field visit for the English Mustard Growers (EMG) who grow for Condimentum (our family are growers for EMG), who turn the growers mustard seed into the iconic Colman’s mustard. The final large visit was hosting the launch of the Lincolnshire arm of the Society of Agriculture , superbly organised by Effie and Richard, on one of the hottest days ever recorded in June! Our final visit was from Barrie and Julie all the way from Christchurch, New Zealand. It was fascinating to hear how their recent harvest had progressed, and to hear some of the challenges they face from being one of the most southern olive groves in the world! North met South!
Vistors to The English Olive Co included Layla Kazim, The English Mustard Growers, the Society of Agriculture and Barrie & Julie from NZ.
As if hosting the olive grove visits wasn’t enough, then David has also been learning from the best and also talking at the Lincolnshire Show! In the middle of the month David and his wife Sally went to visit Sarah Vachon who is owner and founder of Citizens of Soil, a world wide olive oil sommelier, the author of Drizzle, and had a pop up shop for the month of June on Monmouth Street in Covent Garden. The trip from Monmouth Farm, Lincolnshire to Monmouth Street, London was a great occasion, with Sarah tasting our English Olive Oil, and David learning about the many growers that Sarah works with to promote sustainable and profitable farming and great tasting olive oils from growers around the world. We were lucky enough to taste some fantastic oils, including a delicious South African olive oil with fresh tomato flavours. Top tips on olive oil production, care and marketing were carefully listened to, and Sarah generously gave us a signed copy of her book Drizzle - to which we look forward to making many of the recipes.
With the English Olive Co’s conception and the family’s two hundred year old farming background in Lincolnshire, it was a privilege to be asked to talk at the UK Food Valley event at the Lincolnshire Show. With many of the most creative, inspiring and successful Lincolnshire food producers and manufactures in the room David spoke about starting a new brand, the three reasons for the creation of The English Olive Co, and the successes and failures to date. It was also insightful and interesting to listen to the other speakers and to meet new contacts and great to see and catch up with some familiar faces.
Sarah from Citizens of Soil at her pop up shop on Monmouth Street, London. David talking at The Lincolnshire Show Food Valley sector. Finalist of the Great Food Awards.
The English Olive Co has this month kindly been featured in Savills Food Beyond today publication and Brown & Co Innovate 2026 publication; both of the features on The English Olive Co can be read in full at the News page of our website, or click the link here. We are also very excited to be a finalist for the Great Food Club Awards in the Food Producer of the Year category, with the results announced later in the year.; fingers crossed! We have also been on the air waves and regional TV recently; being interviewed during the very hot spell to update the listeners and viewers on how the olives were getting on during the record temperatures, compared to the other crops on the farm. For those of you who missed the interviews, then the olives have loved it, and all the other crops were hot and stressed, a bit like us all in the recent weather!
Finally we would like to wish Lara M from University of Central London who is studying Anthropology the best of luck with her Masters dissertation. Lara has spent a few days with us and in the local community, exploring how we interact with the farm, the olive grove, and the community, under the title of ‘Creating Tradition: Olive Oil, Care and Climate Futures in England’. A truly fascinating subject area and we look forward to reading the final document.
We hope the weather allows more of the olive tree flowers to turn to fruit, and we look forward to keeping you up to date on Instagram and Facebook @TheEnglishOliveCo.
Have a great summer!
Best wishes, David