Pineapple grown in horse manure 'worth £10,000' But despite its high value, the freshly harvested pineapple will not be sold but cut up and fed to garden staff. James Stephens, a Lost Gardens spokesman, described the pineapples as "deliciously sweet, not stringy, and with an explosive flavour." He said: "In an ideal world we'd use about 90 tonnes of manure over the course of year which isn't cheap to source and transport. We've struggled to get good manure this year so we've had to use electric heaters. It is just staff who get to taste the fruits as a thank you for their hard work. It can take up to two years to grow each pineapple so it's only fair. If it was sold in a charity auction or the open market it could fetch up to £10,000 because of how unusual it is. Where else can you get a pineapple grown in Cornwall and in these conditions? The pineapples are grown in a 4ft-deep trench in a 40ft-long "pineapple pit" section of the botanical gardens. They are developed under 30 tonnes of manure and are regularly soaked in horse urine. The original gardens were at their peak during the 19th century. After decades of neglect and a devastating hurricane, they were restored in the 1990s.