3.3 miles Hammiton Farm

Shipton Gorge

Dorset, UK

DT6 4PP

Hammiton Farm is run by Louise and Charles.

Louise’s family have been farming since the 1200s whilst Charles is an ex Royal Navy submariner learning on the job.

We both have a passion for the British countryside and for protecting the environment. Ever since we met at university in the 1990s, where Charles was studying climate change, we have been working towards taking on our own farm.

Our ambition is to do our bit to make our bit a bit better by proving it is possible for a small farm to be economically viable whilst producing food in a genuinely sustainable way.

We were privileged to became the latest stewards of Hammiton Farm in 2019.

Hammiton Farm is small, just 90 acres, and used to be a tenanted dairy farm and part of the larger Sturthill Estate. Like many similar farming estates Sturthill gradually fragmented during the late 20th Century with Hammiton Farm becoming independent in the 1980s.

Hammiton Farm Manuka Honey

We planted our first manuka tree in 2019 and haven’t stopped since.

We now have over 1300 manuka trees in our manuka meadows covering 9 acres of the farm. We grow our manuka trees from seed and since 2024 have been collecting those seeds from our own trees to produce the first generation of Dorset manukas.

The roots of these amazing little trees are helping pump carbon deep into our soils whilst their abundant blossom feeds a wide range of local insects.

We are attempting to produce Dorset’s first manuka honey and, once the trees are ready, we plan to start harvesting the leaves to create delicious manuka tea

Our Bees

An incredibly experienced and respected Dorset beekeeper manages our bees to ensure that they are as healthy and happy as possible. The hives are brought to the farm in the spring, positioned within our manuka meadows and the bees forage our land and the surrounding Bride Valley throughout the summer.

Our challenge is to convince our bees to forage our manuka trees rather than the native wildflowers and blossoms they know and love, something we have not yet managed to do.

The bees then return home with our beekeeper in the autumn so the honey can be expertly extracted using the best equipment and we can check for signs of manuka.

Our Honey

Our bees insist on producing a delicious traditional Dorset summer honey from our wildflowers and hedgerow blossom.

Manuka honey has distinct colour, flavour, thixotropic and chemical characteristics that differentiate it from traditional English honeys. We are looking for these unique markers but have so far seen absolutely no evidence of any manuka in our honey.

We will keep trying and as we plant more manuka trees and they continue to establish and mature we might start to see those magical first cells of manuka in our honey. Until then our bees will continue to make traditional Dorset honey from native flowers on our land.

Hammiton Farm Dorset Honey 2024

A 283 g (10 oz) jar of traditional Dorset summer honey exclusively from hives on our farm. Harvested by our bees through the summer of 2024.

Despite our efforts to tempt them to try something new our bees insist on producing this delicious traditional Dorset summer honey by foraging the low input pastures and mature hedgerows of our carbon negative farm.

You can buy our honey at Modbury Farm Shop. 3.3 miles