Originally posted on our Landshare Blog and several other places, heres a look at the Orchard Amy and myself planted way back when! I was SO proud of everyones efforts and all the years of preparation that brought us to this point, I still am and im sure the Orchard is now producing twice this amount 3 years on....
Bumper Apple Harvest
They grow on a very testing site, exposed to the wind and on heavy clay soil. The fruit trees have had a tough start, but a little bit of tender care and the damp summer of 2012 meant they got their roots in properly, and are now starting to perform as they should. Undeniably it’s been a good year for fruit all round, even our small Vegetable garden Orchard has produced fruit and these trees were only planted in the spring of this year.
One of our volunteers has taken on responsibility for the large Orchard almost entirely and over the course of winter 2012 – 2013 he would come down to see me and tell me about how the pruning was coming along, retie any trees that had come loose, repair rabbit guards etc.
Apple blossom in spring
In the spring he mowed, keeping the grass
low improved the air circulation around the trees and took out
competition for moisture and nutrients. The spring show of blossom,
although later than normal was incredible. There is nothing more
beautiful than standing surrounded by fruit trees in full flower. The
scent on a still day can make your mouth water!
Finally in mid August, our volunteer, Peter started coming back from the Orchard laden with boxes of Apples. At first it was a trickle, then a veritable flood of Apples. Once the kitchen had their fill and they had made Apple pie, Apple crumble, Apple juice and of course offering up our Apples au natural, we started to offer them for sale in our shop …. And still the Apples kept coming! It was beginning to feel a bit like a scene from the Magicians Nephew with crates of Apples stacked waist high and Peter warning me there was more to come, much more.
Finally in mid August, our volunteer, Peter started coming back from the Orchard laden with boxes of Apples. At first it was a trickle, then a veritable flood of Apples. Once the kitchen had their fill and they had made Apple pie, Apple crumble, Apple juice and of course offering up our Apples au natural, we started to offer them for sale in our shop …. And still the Apples kept coming! It was beginning to feel a bit like a scene from the Magicians Nephew with crates of Apples stacked waist high and Peter warning me there was more to come, much more.
Some of the young trees laden with fruit.
At this point we had to get inventive as we
had way more fruit than we could ever deal with so we contacted a local
business, Biddenden Vineyards and consulted with a lovely chap called
Julien, who offered us the solution of juicing our Apples. So a date was
set for collection and a collaboration of the Rangers team and the Veg
garden saw a bright Thursday morning in late September, and an army of
Volunteers set off for the orchard with our hastily assembled Apple
crates. Less than 2 hours later with big smiles the Orchard had been
virtually picked clean.
A happy team of volunteers
We had estimated having about ½ a ton, we
had underestimated, on final weight we had just under a ton of fabulous
Apples. These were sent off for pressing and within 3 days we had our
very own bottles of Apple juice. This means we can carry on enjoying the
fruits of our labour, if you’ll excuse the pun, right into next year.
Well, I say that, that’s if there’s any left as we’re selling it in our
shop, and by all reports it flying out the door!
Me, and a lot of fruit juice!
Finally a quick note about the storm the
other night, there were some casualties, relatively minor ones compared
to how bad things could have been. A few small trees have gone down in
the garden and wider estate, causing very little collateral damage. The
worst thing to happen to the Vegetable garden was that we lost both sets
of the south ends of the polytunnel doors, the wind had, despite our
best efforts, ripped the locks off the doors, snapped the reams of
baling twine we had wrapped around the handles for extra security,
pulled the anchor points clean out of the ground and then proceed to
thrash the doors back and forth till they cried mercy. Thankfully it
appears that’s the worst it did and it shouldn’t take too long to
replace them with something bigger, better and more resilient.
Lou – Senior Vegetable Gardener
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