Nettle eating hosts cancel event after pub reopens

A cider farm which has hosted the World Nettle Eating Championships for the last three years says it will no longer be holding the event in 2025.

Dorset Nectar Cider Farm resurrected the quirky contest after the Bottle Inn in Marshwood closed in 2019, and dates had already been announced for the summer.

But after the new owners of the pub, where the tradition began, revealed plans to revive the event, the current hosts decided to bow out.

"If there were two [contests], they would have diminished each other," said cider farm co-founder Penny Strong. "We wish them well."

The quirky tradition sees contestants eat as many leaves as possible before the empty stalks are counted.

Tessa and Julian Blundy, who have been renovating the Bottle Inn, said they were responding to customer demand by bringing the competition "back home", although a date has not been set.

The cider farm, in Waytown, had already advertised its event for the 21 June 2025 and initially said it would be going ahead.

But on Monday afternoon, it announced on Facebook it was "handing over the baton".

Mrs Strong told Radio Solent the tradition "was being forgotten" before the cider farm revived it in 2021.

"It hadn't run for some years and the pub where it had started was completely derelict," she said.

"We took it on, breathed new life into it - this incredibly beautiful and fantastically quirky festival.

"Now, the pub is in a much stronger position.

"It is where it originally started in 1986 and we think it's the right thing to hand it back to them."

Renovations continue at the Bottle Inn, which has been opening for locals on select days, and it is due to reopen fully in the new year.

The cider farm's other events include the annual Wassail, which takes place on 25 January.

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