"A" is for Apples and Apricots

"A" is for Apricots

In the next few blogs I will have the pleasure of introducing you to the delicious fruit grown at Excelsior Orchard. Although Apple is alphabetically before Apricot, the apricots bloom first in the orchard so I figured it was more appropriate to start with apricots. Since they are the first fruit to bloom in the spring this also makes them the most vulnerable to freeze. In the last six years we have had only two years we haven't lost apricots either all of them or most of them to freeze.



Excelsior's Apricots

Excelsior has about 200 apricot trees of which 1/2 are a variety called Sungold and the other 1/2 Goldrich Although a some fruits are self-pollinating most fruits require two varieties or more for pollination. The Sungold, is a medium size apricot that is quite sweet to eat and makes excellent jam and jellies. The Goldrich is a large variety with bright dark orange color and strong apricot taste. The Goldrich is a hearty apricot that is easy to pick and store without bruising compared to the smaller, more delicate Sungold.



Pruning and Thinning i. e., work

The apricots are prolific trees and will over produce fruit. Part of our spring maintenance is pruning of the apricots where you top off and remove branches. This also helps remove some of the fruit. Then as with all the fruit you must thin by hand. That is pick off more than half the fruit before it begins to ripen. Rule of thumb is a fist between each fruit. This is really hard to do for a several reasons including it's a lot of work and it is hard to psychologically to do. Even though I know if we don't thin properly the fruit will be small and some damaged because they grow into each other and it overburdens the trees. I cringe knocking off those beautiful, potential fruits. Ah but it must be done. Thinning improves your product and produces the big, juicy healthy apricot that people really want. Now I will put in a plug for our apricots and our Farmer Market friends, Frank and Nancy Zinno of Z'best Scones, Taos, NM. A few years back when we had a ample crop of apricots, Nancy began using them in her scones. She cooked the apricots and even froze the puree. The apricot scones were a big hit with her customers and every year she talks about the apricots and hopes we will have another crop soon. Fortunately, this year I think we can get Nancy all the apricots she needs to make those delicious scones. So stop by the Taos, Los Alamos, and Santa Fe Farmers Markets for the best scones in NM. And I will be able to finish up my apricot jam that I have been hoarding and make room for new jam. I don't think I have ever met someone that doesn't love apricot jam.

Spring Planting

Planting new trees. Trees can take around 3 years to produce fruit and usually 7 or more to be fully productive. If they stay healthy, trees can have a life span of 25 or more years depending on many factors. One has to be patient in the Orchard business. Over the past few years we have learned much about what to do and not to do when planting new trees. When we bought the orchard we had around 2000 trees and this year after planting we will have a net 3000 trees.





2007 Planting Peaches and Nectarines.

The last three years we have planted over 1100 new trees and have learned a lot about tree survival. This year, 2010 Paul is planting 300 cherry trees and 200 peach trees this week. We tried the first year to replace trees that had died for one reason or another, disease, porcupines, voles, bears, old age, poor soil etc. So we planted 300 peach and nectarine trees in "skips". That is, we removed the dead tree and replaced it with a new tree in the same location. See photo above of Florencio and James being supervised by Lwee. Lwee finds shovels, backhoes, brooms just too exciting so he didn't stay long in the job. In 2007 Paul used the backhoe to remove the old tree and dig a hole for the new one. Even so it was quite labor intensive to refill the hole made from the bucket. We have some of the best nectarines you have ever tasted. I call them peaches on steroids. For a few years we also had a nice harvest but began to lose trees each year. The main cause for the tree demise was Cytospora Canker a fungus that attacks all stone fruit (peach, apricot, nectarine, cherry) and some pome fruit. The nectarines had already had the fungus when we bought the orchard. And then we had severe bear damage for two years and lost many peach and nectarine trees as the bears broke limbs to reach a nice ripe fruit. Cytospora takes advantage of injured trees with open wounds moved into the peach/nectarine blocks. Small branches die and around the tree one will see cracks in the trunk and an oozing sap like substance. We learned that planting skips although seemed practical was not the way to go and that it was better to establish new blocks of trees.

2008 Planting - Plums

In 2008 we added a new fruit, 4 kinds of plums and planted more nectarines and cherries all in new blocks. See plum photo. This time, Paul used an auger attached to the tractor. After planting we put down agricultural cloth to minimize weeds at the root stock. New blocks need irrigation lines run to each tree after planting. The plums really took off and we even had fruit last year but the bears ate the few plums we had although we lost most of them to frost. The apricots and cherries didn't fair so well and many of them did not take. But the agricultural cloth did create a little problem. It seems that voles (sort of a big mouse and Miko's favorite snack) like to winter under the cloth and will chew on the trees. We pulled up the cloth and treated the trunks and somehow did not lose the plums but the damage was too much for the nectarines and some cherries. Hopefully this year we will have a nice crop of plums and we can find out what they taste like.

2009 - Planting cherries and nectarines

2009 Paul got more sophisticated on planting having a couple years experience. And we had Andy who came to us as a WWOOF'r available to help and Bill who was renting our house on Grand Ave. Andy grew up on a farm in Ohio and has proven to be an excellent worker. He is back with us this year planting more trees and will help Paul build the new 6KW micro-hydro plant (story to follow in a few weeks). In 2009 we planted a new variety of cherries, Bentons, which are supposed to bloom 2 weeks after the current varieties (Bing, Rainier, Lambert, Queen Anne). We are hoping to minimize the chance of losing all the cherries to freeze. We also planted some more nectarines.. try try again. These trees got a lot of extra tender loving care. Each tree (all 500 or so) got nice little wire collars around their base to deter those pesky voles and the collars went on after carefully hoeing weeds and grass away from the stock. We were lucky that James had his friend Diana stay with us last summer and they dutifully made and attached all the little wire collars (yes, 500 of them) to each tree. No agricultural cloth and this year, no vole damage and 100% of the trees made it. We also thought we lost about 100 prime cherry trees to voles last year. The voles girdled the trunks sometime during the winter. Paul tried sealing the trunks but as the summer went on they began to wither. But.. new news, Paul said the trees are looking OK this spring so TSBD (to still be determined).

2010 - Planting Cherries and Peaches

Last Friday the new trees arrived. Paul likes to get them into the
ground as soon as possible. One year we had to wait because of rain and it seemed we lost more trees then if they get planted right away. Andy is back. The blocks need to be surveyed and laid out for each tree. After surveying he would spray the ground with orange paint to indicate where to auger. Then Paul can use the tractor to drill the hole while Andy places the tree in and covers with soil. Paul uses the other tractor equipped with a tank to water each new tree. He has found that the new trees need ample watering when planted. Paul said they are able to plant about 90 trees a day so just planting takes about 6 days. After the trees are in the irrigation lines need to be run (no small task) and then the hoeing, wire baskets and lots and lots of watering.

Every year the trees come in April. And as you can see every April is different, sometimes it is very green and spring like and this year there is still snow and dead grass. Paul said today that the apricots have begun to bloom. That's April 12th and last year they bloomed March 15th and yes we lost them all to frost. So this year is looking good.. so far.

To Bee or Not To Bee

Honey Bees - When we purchased Excelsior the orchard did not have it's own source of bees. The previous owners preferring to "rent" hives, that is, the practice where someone brings hives to the orchard for a period of time. In part because we are an organic orchard one of the projects Paul wanted to start was raising bees and harvesting honey. He has a long time friend, Rusty who has been a beekeeper (apiarist) for many years and could get him started. He began with three what are call "nucs"; a box that contains a queen, a small assortment of nurse bees, drones and worker bees. Rusty and Paul built the structure and enclosed them in a hot wire fence to ward off predators. That was 2004 a year where we had some very big bears causing havoc and destruction in our peaches, apples, pears and nectarines. Destroying dozens of trees and creating quite a financial loss. In the bears path of course were the new hives which must have been either an appetizer or dessert. (see photo). Well that did not deter Paul. Next year they built a small fortress to house the bees. Huge posts and wire including barb wire and a serious electric fence. There is corrugated steel on the ground outside the fence to assure the bear gets good conduction with the ground. We haven't had any bear pressure since. Each year Paul has tried different methods of generating hives. The "nucs" which are most expensive and sometimes hard to come by, purchasing queens and splitting hives, and growing a queen for a hive. And to date each method has worked but unfortunately the very small pests, mites, ants, yellow jackets have had their turns at killing off the hives. We also have had problems with very cold weather so Paul began feeding the bees in the winter and trying to minimize their heat loss. Last fall we had six pretty healthy hives which Paul fed the last time in February. Yesterday he checked on the hives and we had lost all three in the west side "fortress". That leaves us with three hives on the east for the whole orchard. The funny thing about honey bees that I didn't know is that they don't like bad weather. If it's below 50 deg and/or windy and wet .. they don't work. Funny huh. I keep saying we need to just get a bunch of bumble bees - they work in all weather because they don't have a nice cozy hive. I have several bee stories and some great photos I will cover in future blogs. An you will hear more about Lizzy.

In the meantime check out her Blog "Once Upon a Plate"
http://lizzy-onceuponaplate.blogspot.com/ and her some of her outstanding photographs of the orchard and its inhabitants at:
http://lizzy-onceuponaplate.blogspot.com/2009/11/orchard-pictorial.html
An Orchard Pictorial - November 5, 2009.

Lizzy came to us through the WWOOF program and we are really lucky that she will be back in May.

Today, the fruit buds are growing but still tucked away, it's cool, windy and cloudy - oh when will those blossoms come out?

The bond between Mother Nature and Excelsior Orchard

In my first blog you were introduced to us (Paul and Elane), who in 2003 (on a bit of a whim) bought a certified organic orchard in Paonia, Colorado a mere 350 miles (7 hour drive) from our home and paying jobs. Two things are obvious 1. ) countless events have occurred with the Orchard between 2003 and now and 2. ) and yes, we still have the Orchard. I don't want to bore everyone and myself with a complete chronological 7 year history and in part, because there are so many worthy current events. For sure though, I will include in this blog stories of the past years. Orchards are beautiful, soothing and awe inspiring. Compared to other types of farms, they are relatively quiet, occupy a lot of space and are quite majestic. Even though the orchard continually occupies the same space and coordinates each season brings new landscapes and every year each season is never the same. I not only have to introduce you to this dynamic space of earth but to the creatures big and small that occupy our orchard. I walk the orchard with my dogs every day to check the trees, the buds, the blossoms, the fruit, the fences, looking for sign of predators big and little, who came in the orchard last night, who left and who didn't. On an orchard you are never far from Mother Nature and as we have found out, she can be very fickle. The last three years she chose to give us warm February weather thus bringing out the apricot and cherry blossoms early and vulnerable to frost. In fact in 2007 we lost all our crops, 2008 apricots and cherries, 2009 apricots, cherries, nectarines, plums. The blossoms die within minutes of a hard freeze, temperatures below 26 deg F and slowly die with temperatures of 28 deg .. maybe an hour or so. And then.. that is it for the year. It is a very heart wrenching thing to see beautiful blossoms turn brown and ugly within a day or so. This year we still don't have bloom and that seems to be good news. Maybe by the time the early fruit blossoms we may be through the freeze cycle .. maybe. Still to be determined.

In the beginning...

Excelsior Orchard is located in the North Fork Valley of the Gunnison River ("Excelsior" translated from Latin as "ever higher", also loosely but more widely as "onward and upward") was established in the late 1890's. Excelsior Orchard has had many owners but always remained a working orchard. In 2003 my husband Paul and I went to Paonia just to "look around". We happened by a For Sale sign and saw this lovely little farm house and what looked to be 3 or 4 acres of old cherry trees. Quite lovely. I like fresh cherries. After some investigating we found out the little orchard was actually 120 acres with 2 houses and a large packing shed. The owners Gary and Pat Andrew had owned it for 10 years and had achieved "Certified Organic" status. Well what's 120 acres?? Room for more dogs and maybe I will get a horse. Paul had grown up on an orchard in California and even raised chickens. This sounds like fun. And that was all it took. By November we had purchased outright 60 acres that included all the fruit trees, buildings, equipment - back hoes and tractors and the remodeled 1904 farm house. We were on our way to becoming gentle people farmers or "orchardists" or ... and retirement isn't far away - what the heck.