Watercress Production in Baldock

Traditional method

Traditional watercress growers are defined by Environment Agency licensing requirements as growers who would replant their beds no more than once a year between the beginning of June and the end of September. Most cleaning and re-sowing takes place between March and July.

Watercress is grown in shallow gravel beds fed by springs and bore-holes, which provide a constant flow of relatively warm, pure, chalk-filtered spring water.

Watercress is either grown from seed or through vegetative propagation. At the start of the UK season, watercress seeds are propagated on thin layers of compost within greenhouses and poly-tunnels.

After about 7 to 10 days, the seedlings are transplanted into the gravel beds outside.

Pure spring water is introduced to the crop, gently at first and then in ever increasing volumes with a mature bed needing an average of 5,000 gallons per acre per hour.

The growing time can be anything from 28 to 70 days depending on the weather.

Traditionally watercress was considered a winter crop, harvested during months with a R (September to April). (Jonathan Cox, 2009)

Watercress production in Baldock:

Watercress growing on stretches of chalk rivers developed from 1850 onwards. The growing population of London was hungry for fresh vegetables/salads and watercress offered a nutritious crop through autumn and winter months. The expansion of the railways made transportation to London quick and easy. In Victorian Britain it was called ‘the poor man’s bread’, it provided the working class with a good portion of nutrition for the day and became one of the first foods for on-the-go.

UK census records at Blackhorse Mill in 1891 and 1901 identify James Frederick Moody as a watercress grower.