August 2021 at Stourton

Venison

We are delighted to let you know that we will be selling our fresh vension from the ‘veni-van’ on Friday 3^rd September from 10am-4pm.   If you place an order for frozen venison online we will bag it up ready for you to collect from us too!  You will find us parked up near our Stourton Woods entrance, off Clay lane (A158) in Baumber (follow the Walled Garden Baumber turning signs).

All cuts will be available along with some recipe cards for inspiration. So you can stock up your freezer or just buy something a bit different for your Sunday lunch!

To make it easier for you to get hold of our venison we are planning on doing this monthly from now until Christmas, so please keep an eye on our social media for future dates

Events

Mud, Sweat & Gears!

We had the pleasure of hosting the Mud, Sweat & Gears Eastern series of the mountain bike cross county racing event at the weekend.  This was the first time the Eastern series of racing has come to Lincolnshire which is a great for the area. It was a fabulous turn out with many different classes of riders racing around a 4km loop of the estate – although we’re not sure with the speed they were travelling that they had time to take in the views!

The event was supported by Focus Rides Coaching who provided coaching to those who wanted some extra help or hints and tips for improving their performance and Greenan Cycles from Horncastle had a range of bike accessories on offer.  Teams and their supporters also had the option to camp for the weekend.

Graham Elliott the leading event organiser said:

“Having organised literally hundreds of cycling events it was great, albeit unusual to find a venue with such supportive and enthusiastic owners. The surroundings were picturesque and nothing seemed too much trouble. Where something wasn’t practical alternative solutions were easily found. 

I would be very surprised if this wasn’t the first of many similar events at this venue. All the feedback from the riders has been uniformly positive and trust me when I say cycle racers are not backwards in saying what they think!”

With feedback like that we’re certainly hoping that we can put the event on again next year!

Open day – Saturday 11^th September

We are pleased to announce that we will be hosting another open day on Saturday 11th September. As per our previous open days we will be open for visitors to explore the estate at their leisure from 10am – 4pm.

This is a great opportunity to walk, cycle, run or just relax, and see the deer in the normally private parkland, woodland and lakes. Visitors can enjoy Stourton Estates for free at our open days; however there is a car parking fee of £3, payable upon entry.

We will be running deer safaris throughout the day, if you wish to book in advance you can do so here.  There will also be some fun activities for children including a scavenger hunt around the estate; find all the clues and claim your prize!

Refreshments will also be available from Fleurs Kitchen in the arboretum.  We will also have delicious Stourton Honey, deer antlers and frozen Venison available for you to purchase and take home.

Well behaved dogs on leads are more than welcome to join you for the day too.

We look forward to seeing you!

If you are unable to make this open day we will be hosting another on Sunday 10^th October, which will be our last open day of the year.

Enchanted Woodland Lights (4^th-6^th November)

We can announce though that we will be holding out Enchanted Woodland Lights event on 4^th, 5^th and 6^th of November.  We are so excited to be able to host this event again.  It’s a real favourite! Not only will you be able to enjoy a walk through the arboretum in all its lit up glory but there will also be fire dancers, a fire pit with marshmallows available to toast and refreshments. The walk will have a Covid secure one way system and numbers will be limited to ensure that social distancing is possible.

We can assure you that there are no fireworks or loud bangs at this event so it’s perfect for dogs to attend too.

Tickets will be on sale soon!

Weddings

We are super busy with weddings here at Stourton.  We have worked really hard to ensure that anyone who needed to reschedule has managed to and we’ve even fitted in a few extras!

We are delighted for Asha & Matthew who held their celebration earlier this month after the 3^rd attempt due to COVID complications, such a lovely couple and the sun actually shone!

We are hosting a festival styled wedding on 4^th September and a further celebrant service in the woods on 18^th September.

We are almost fully booked for 2022 and are now taking bookings for 2023. We do limit the number of weddings we host each year so if you are looking for a flexible wedding venue set within beautiful woodland please don’t hesitate to get in touch.

Logs

We have just undergone our Woodsure accreditation. The Woodsure Certification scheme comprehensively checks woodfuel producers to ensure that they produce and supply woodfuel to the correct standard. This means you can be assured that the wood products you purchase from us have been checked and tested and that our logs are indeed a high quality product.

Logs will be available to order again very soon.

On the Farm

I’m not sure that I mention the weather enough when writing the farming section for the newsletter?  Well, once again the weather is providing us with some very frustrating conditions for harvest. Following a very wet mid-August week the weather has dried up but the overcast and ‘mizzly’ conditions means that the crops are not drying quickly enough during the day to make good headway and keen followers of Clarkson’s farm now know that with harvest it’s all about  the moisture content. A delayed harvest also delays our ability to work land and drill the crops for next year’s harvest. All in all very frustrating!

Fingers crossed for a continued dry spell and this promised ‘heat –wave’ so that we can crack on and get the crop out of the field and into the shed.

Deer Diary

We are delighted to let you know that Dotty is now back where she belongs, with the herd. The re-introduction went very smoothly and she is settling in very nicely in her new home.  She still has a bottle every morning and night, which she pronks (runs!) across the field for with great enthusiasm.  She occasionally tries to follow us out of the field to ‘come home’ with us. We have to say, despite its challenges we have really enjoyed having a pet deer at home and it’s certainly been an experience but we are also absolutely thrilled that she has re-joined the herd and is back where she belongs and seems to be thriving with her friends.

The stags have now lost all the velvet on their antlers, and with the testosterone levels rocketing the noise of chinking antlers can be heard across the field where they are gently sparring with each other. The next step is to separate Winston and Nelson from the other boys and get them ready for joining the hinds for the rut.  We’re hoping that as these are two very good natured animals we can do this fairly easily over the next few weeks… we’ll let you know!

We hope to see you at one of our forthcoming events or at the veni-van on Friday 3^rd Sept!

Antony & Helen