Plum review

The UK plum season started off in the last week of July and will run until around the middle of October thanks to the cold storage of the later varieties. The majority of the fruit is grown around the Vale ofo Evesham in Worcestershire from suppliers such as A H Hiller, one of the largest plum growers in the country with over 150 acres of production. New Kent suppliers are also being developed. Yhe season started with early varieties such as Opal, which has a few problems with russet and then moves onto Victoria, the most popular of all varieties. This year Victoria's produced another good crop for a second year running, an unusual occurence in plum production. However, from a marketing perspective although the volume available appeared to be good quality was dissappointing.
Victoria is a good traditional variety with high flavour and very versatile in its uses. Later varieties such as Marjorie Seedling were helped along by the warm spring weather and lack of frosts during the blossom period. Ideal growing conditions are a warm spring and then plenty of sunshine mixed with some rain as the fruit ripens, although not too much rain and or the fruit will swell causing delicate skins to burst. Selling prices were similar to last year, howevee even though the production was similar to last years position higher prices weren't expected due to availability of fruit thanks to the larger than average crop. Due to delicate nature of the thin skins the UK fruit has been marketed by the multiples in punnets and treated with the same high care as soft fruit.

Autumn 2002