Winter at FPM signals the start of lifting

Winter at Frank P Matthews always signals the start of lifting. This is the process of lifting the bare root trees from the fields and preparing them for dispatch.

Historically this task was the most arduous on the nursery. Every tree had to be hand dug, and in the 1960’s it was described as a “campaign” rather than a job. Over time, hand digging gave way to a mechanical winch, which pulled from one headland to another with a blade which undercut the tree roots. This was later improved by a side lifter attached to the rear of a tractor and today the physicality of lifting has been greatly reduced by further mechanisation.

Although the equipment has changed, the principles of lifting bare-root trees remain the same. We wait for dormancy, which is when the trees are no long actively growing and the carbohydrates from the new growth move to the root zone. This is characterised by leaf fall. Dormancy is first achieved by our two year trees in mid to late October followed by our maidens in early November. Once dormant, the trees are lifted from the soil, graded, and tied into bundles of five ready for dispatch.

Even 10 years ago this process was all undertaken in the fields, in all weather conditions with a team of between 14 and 18. Today the field operations involve two machinery operators and three members of the field team.

The trees are mechanically lifted from the ground, moved onto a platform via belts and then via a conveyor onto a stillage. These stillages are then transported to our yard and into our goods-inwards facility.

In this facility the trees are processed. This involves sorting them by grade, separating out orders from free stock and our own crop for potting. Gone are the days of paperwork getting muddy in the field. Today large wall mounted screens show the team what crop they are working on, and what grades they are separating out. The counting is all undertaken via tablet and the stillage numbers are logged on our stock system.

Once processed the stillages of trees are then either stored at our heeling in bays prior to despatch or moved into coldstore.

Watch the video below to see how our bare root trees are lifted.