Brecks Vineyard is part of a diversification strategy at the Young family's Grange Farm in Hockwold, near Thetford.

The 7.5ha field was established in May 2023, with 31,500 vines growing eight varieties of grapes, mainly used to make English sparkling white wines.

The first commercial harvest of 40 tonnes of grapes was completed in September - with half machine-harvested for Flint Vineyard in Bungay, and half hand-picked by a 21-strong team to be delivered to Henners in East Sussex.

The first grapes have been harvested at the new Brecks Vineyard at Hockwold, near Thetford(Image: Brecks Vineyard)

And this extra income was particularly valuable in a year which has illustrated the financial vulnerability of growing traditional crops.

The farm grows around 1,200t of onions per year, but this year’s yield was only about 800t, after the summer drought prompted the Environment Agency to enforce a sudden ban on abstracting irrigation water in the Ely Ouse catchment in July.

Tim Young said this would cost the family business "tens of thousands of pounds - probably getting towards hundreds of thousands".

And potential future droughts and water resource pressures were among the key factors in deciding to plant a vineyard to diversify revenues at the farm.

Tim Young at the new Brecks Vineyard, where the first commercial grape harvest has been gathered at Hockwold, near Thetford(Image: Chris Hill)

"It just mitigates the risk," he said. "Thank goodness, this year, just at the time where my onions have not performed, I have got something else to soften the blow.

"It is like any........

© Eastern Daily Press