BJJ News | I ssue 6 | M arch 2015
Orthopod’s view
A Somerset Cider Orchard
C.E. Ackroyd
Chris Ackroyd, now retired from orthopaedic practice, shares with us his second career as a cider apple farmer
he drinking of apple juice and cider goes back several thousand years. Apples trees were growing in the United Kingdom well before the Romans arrived in 43 AD but it was they who introduced organised cultivation. Northern France was renowned for its orchards and vineyards as indeed was southern England. These areas became less suitable for the growing of grapes due to climatic changes and gradually cider began to replace wine in the United Kingdom. After the Norman Conquest in 1066 changes were introduced which led to an increased popularity of cider and new varieties of apples were developed. It became the drink of the people and its production spread rapidly. By the 14th century cider production was well established in many of the counties of southern Britain and had spread even as far north as Yorkshire. Cider was produced in substantial quantities on farms and by the 18thcentury it was customary to pay a farm labourer’s wage in cider. A typical allowance would be three to four pints a day although at harvest time the allowance was considerably increased. In the western counties of England a farm worker could receive up to one fifth of his wages in cider. One might question what this did for productivity! In the latter part of the 19th century a campaign to stop payment in the form of alcoholic beverages led to its prohibition in the Truck Act of 1887. By the end of the First World War cider drinking was in decline. Beer was becoming more accepted and the growth of French wine drinking was hitting sales hard. Cider making was becoming restricted to parts of Kent and the West Country including Gloucestershire and Herefordshire. In France and the UK, cider apples tended to be grown towards the western extremities where the climate and soil conditions are most suitable. Under the influence of the Gulf Stream the weather is relatively mild and the area has a fairly high annual rainfall. After the war, in 1924, a young Bristol University graduate, Redvers Coate, took a year`s unpaid job at the newly founded Long Ashton Research Station and was inspired to open a cider works at Nailsea with help from family and friends. He was just 23 years of age and so was born “Coates Cider of Nailsea”. Redvers Coate had installed the most up to date equipment including three glass-lined vats holding ten thousand gallons each. At the end of the first year Coates Cider took three prizes in the National Cider Competition.
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Fig. 1 May blossom
Fig. 2 Sheep grazing, April to September
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