R and L holt


Our adventure took a new path today as we left London for our last day in the city. We had a lovely train ride to Evesham England, they have sheep everywhere. 


We had the Opportunity to tour R and L Holt, which was actually a site I was the leader for. We were met by Rick and Laura Holt, who were the cutest married couple I have seen while in England. Their 22 acres of tomato glass-house, was one of the most interesting tours for me that we have been on so far.
My interest lies in controlled agriculture and I was very interested to see how growing in Michigan compares to the UK. It’s interesting that they have the same problems we have but just a little different. 


They use yellow sticky card but they use long rolls of it.


They use bio-controls (bugs that eat pests) in a similar fashion but with different target organisms.


When rick brought us to see the actual facility one thing we noticed was how clean the area was. Even though there was a lot of debris on the ground, there were a lot of people working to clean it up.


I was very interested in how they felt Brexit will affect their business and they answered the question before we had a chance to ask. Their comment on it was that they think the government will not stop importing tomatoes because of the price difference, and the UK only grows something like 20% of the tomatoes. They felt that they will remain relatively unaffected by their government changes.


Their labor issues were also very interesting, they are unable to get enough local labor because all of the young adults move into the city so they use Eastern Europeans. It is interesting that the whole world has the same problem with labor.


And of course while in Stratford we went to see Shakespeare house.

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