STONE FRUIT
The majority of our orchard consists of stone fruit – apricots, peaches and nectarines. We have a preference for older varieties that are full of flavour. Many of these varieties are not commonly available from green grocers or supermarkets as they need to be handled with care to ensure that they don’t get bruised. For this reason, we pick our fruit directly into the boxes we bring to market and we do not subject our fruit to being washed or graded. We grade our fruit at market in front of our customers and we leave the washing of the fruit to our customers – less handling before eating means less chance of bruising the fruit.
The advantage of grading our fruit at market means we have some seconds available which we gladly cut up as samples for our customers. We are proud of our produce and encourage customers to ‘try before they buy’.
Our stone fruit is brought to market within days of harvest – our promise to our customers is that we will not bring fruit to market that has spent more than a week in the cool room.
APRICOTS
We currently grow two varieties of apricot for fresh fruit and drying, they are Mystery and Flavorcot. Our apricots flower in August/September and our we harvest Flavorcots in early December and Mysteries mid-late December.
We offer our apricots for sale as fresh fruit within days of harvest, and those that are not sold as fresh fruit we then cut and dry so that they are available during the year.
PEACHES
Most of our customers are familiar with our Elberta peaches – an heirloom variety with exceptional flavour. We also grow Red Haven and Fairtime peaches (both yellow flesh) to extend our harvest.
Each of our peach varieties has been around for many years and all have excellent flavour.
We also cut and dry any of our Elberta peaches that are not sold as fresh fruit. Our peaches flower in September and are harvested at the following times:
Red Haven: matures late December. Originated in South Haven, Michigan in 1940. Moderately juicy with very good flavour.
Elberta: matures late January to mid February. Dates back to 1875 and was named after the grower’s wife, Clara Elberta Moore. One of the sweetest peaches you will ever eat.
Fairtime: matures in March. A large, freestone peach with delicious flavour. Discovered in 1968 in California.
NECTARINES
Flavoursome nectarines are not really that difficult to grow – just pick an old variety and allow it to ripen on the tree! We currently grow Flavortop nectarines.
Flavortop: matures mid January (yellow flesh). Discovered in Fresno California in 1969. One of the most popular nectarines for taste.