Heather in bloom: what August means on the holding

From the first week of August the hills around us turn purple, and for about three weeks nothing else on the holding matters. Heather (Calluna vulgaris) is our biggest single harvest of the year, and the hardest to time well.

Why timing matters

The flowers need picking just as they open, when the oils are highest and the colour holds through drying. A week late and they brown in the dryer; a week early and half the spike is still green. We walk the moor most evenings from late July, watching the south-facing banks that always come first.

How we harvest

We comb the flowering tips by hand — never cut, never pull — taking a strip here and a strip there so no patch is stripped bare. The moor we harvest is unimproved and ungrazed, and the same banks have given us heather every year since we started. Bees work the same flowers we do, so we pick early in the morning before they arrive in numbers.

What it becomes

Dried heather flowers go into our teas and winter blends — the taste is gently floral with a honeyed edge, and it has a long tradition in Scotland as a calming evening drink. We also supply small-batch brewers reviving heather ale, one of the oldest brewed drinks in these islands.

If you want this year's harvest, join the notification list — heather sells out faster than anything else we pick.