A FARM stall owner who turned detective after produce disappeared says if it hadn't been for the support of her 'brilliant' customers she could have easily closed her business down.

After posting a video on Facebook, where it has been viewed over 7,000 times, Lynne Chellow from Devichoys Farm near Mylor Bridge says the messages of support have persuaded her to keep going.

Mrs Chellow, who set up the stalls with her sister Sally at the entrance to their farm on the Carclew Road, told the Packet that she'd had a few things going during the summer but on Saturday, between her opening at 9am and going back at 12 noon, £59 worth of goods disappeared. The honesty box where people place the money was empty.

She was so outraged she spent all Saturday afternoon in the pouring rain setting up CCTV cameras in her stall.

After finishing at 4.30pm she left to go back up to the farm but when she returned to check first thing on Sunday morning she found more items had gone.

When they checked the CCTV she had a video of a man at the stall at the time the goods disappeared, picking up items. He is not seen leaving a any money. There may be a perfectly innocent explanation for his presence but Lynne says she would like to identify him so he can explain his actions.

"We finished putting them [the cameras] up at half past four and I went down Sunday morning and noticed two pots of jam gone and red cabbage gone," she said.

"I looked in the money box, nothing, so I took the camera down we put it in the computer and we had brilliant images.

"We reported it to the police and asked can we put the pictures and the video up on Facebook, they said yep.

"My son put it on Facebook on Monday evening and by this morning (Wednesday) we've had seven thousand views."

She said they have also had reports that a similar image was captured in Constantine on a stall there.

"We also had a message about this person who runs a similar stall in Constantine and has a similar image to ours because he's using his mobile phone," she said.

"It makes you feel like giving up and closing up but then we thought about our great customers because we have had brilliant messages of support from people, it keeps you going.

"We just hope that anyone who comes along just realises that we take it seriously and we do follow it up and we now have four cameras there capturing every angle."

Lynne and her sister set up the stall during the first lockdown to help people out after they grew too much produce for themselves.

First of all they sold veg and eggs and then it evolved with her sister-in-law making jams and chutneys and then members of family making things including her 85-year old aunt who made face masks and her husband's father turning wood.

"You do it for your local community. We don't do it to make a profit. It's because we enjoy doing it, making a difference and making people happy.

"It was so popular we did another for Halloween and that was really popular and then we did it for Christmas and everybody loved it and now we are doing one for Valentine's Day and are calling it The Love Shack."