Any soft fruit growers out there?

[Veryfruity]

There are now commercial apricot orchards in Kent, Bardsley farms produce 200 odd tons.

I haven’t heard of anyone growing figs commercially in the uk. I’ve got a couple of rows in France.
Odd trees, like cats they do their own thing. We just prune, feed and water, and they crop when they want.

They do have the strangest of pollination methods, using a special co- evolved wasp that lives in the growing fruit.

Here’s a link for fruit geeks

Fig Wasps

www.fs.fed.us

 

[Kidds]

Anybody got any juicing apples for sale or know where I might get some?

The frosts in May have left me with hardly any fruit. I need dessert apples preferably, some Discovery and or Katy would be a start but main season is what I was really after.
I expect I will need 15 ton or more to make my crop up but a ton here and there would help. Can collect, can supply bins, might even be able to pick some I am that desperate.
Cheshire based but not expecting anything local.
A pointer to someone that might have some would help too.

 

[Tonka]

Why is soft fruit so tasteless?
My wife bought some strawberries. Ashamed to say from a supermarket and was rubbish. This was from a local fruit farm. It looked fantastic.

Was going to say it was like eating a neep. But a neeps quite tasty in my opinion.

Sunshine is so important for taste....

 

[18 wheeler]

We will have juicing apples available. Kent is a fair trek from Cheshire though.

 

[stewart]

Sunshine is so important for taste....

As is variety, we are paid extra for DM% as there is a direct link between Dry Matter and taste, 70% of our payments are based on DM.

 

[Christoph1945]

There are now commercial apricot orchards in Kent, Bardsley farms produce 200 odd tons.

I haven’t heard of anyone growing figs commercially in the uk. I’ve got a couple of rows in France.
Odd trees, like cats they do their own thing. We just prune, feed and water, and they crop when they want.

They do have the strangest of pollination methods, using a special co- evolved wasp that lives in the growing fruit.

Here’s a link for fruit geeks

Fig Wasps

www.fs.fed.us

As a non-farmer living in North Western England and as something of a Biblical study I planted a Brown Turkey Fig in our back garden some years ago. Using a plastic kitchen bin sunken into the earth (to restrict the roots) I placed the then twig in a position against a section of concrete fencing, where it would catch the sun from dawn till dusk. The tree has, until last year, cropped abundantly but stayed within the limits of our small garden.

How large are your fig trees and when do you prune them?

 

[Christoph1945]

Just got back from a quick surf of the internet and read up about the fig wasps but must confess that I have never seen one in all the years that our fig has been growing; they must be very small indeed!

I also visited the Bardsley website.
Did I find the Bardsley site interesting? Yes I did! Was I impressed by the Bardsley operations? Yes I was! Did my visit raise any questions for me? Yes it did!

1 I wonder why I have never heard of Bardsley farms and fruit before?
2 Thinking back to the old hop picking days of Kent, when whole families holidayed for the hop picking season, would such operational practices be impractical these days.
3 With all that fruit juice available, is anyone turning it into first class fruit wine?
4 How, I wonder, do they manage bird and wasp damage to their ripening fruit?
5 Have they considered, perhaps, trying an experimental fig plantation?

I will leave the other fifteen questions for a later date; after all, a fool can ask more questions than a wise man can answer!

 

[Kidds]

We will have juicing apples available. Kent is a fair trek from Cheshire though.

I'm interested, will pm.

 

[Veryfruity]

How large are your fig trees and when do you prune them

Our trees are about 2.5 m high, and I prune them into a sort of dome. I usually prune them when we’ve finished the peaches in February.
I just thin them really to keep the shape and allow uncluttered access.

 

[Christoph1945]

I fell in love with fresh figs way back in the early seventies, when I was introduced to them at a Turkish farmers market.
Mind you, they were also selling medicinal leeches there but I passed on those!

I believe that a tree will sometimes produce several crops in the same year; providing that the conditions are conducive to do so. I tried taking a couple of cuttings last year but out of the three cuttings only two made it through to this year. I wonder if your prunings could be rooted up and sold on as young fig trees.

 

[Veryfruity]

In a Mediterranean climate they generally crop twice, end of June and September.

The cuttings take easily in late winter, but I always buy trees from a nursery, as you can lose lots of very enjoyable time propagating plants. The chap I bought my trees from just does figs, and there are loads of varieties.

 

[stewart]

Our trees are about 2.5 m high, and I prune them into a sort of dome. I usually prune them when we’ve finished the peaches in February.
I just thin them really to keep the shape and allow uncluttered access.

Have you looked at pruning them in a V shape? This lets light into the middle of the tree.

 

[Veryfruity]

I

Have you looked at pruning them in a V shape? This lets light into the middle of the tree.

Sorry I haven’t looked for a while,

I empty the centre of the tree to do just that. Though I don’t prune to a V like peaches.

 

[Christoph1945]

How can one inhibit, unintentionally, the fruiting of fig trees?

 

[carpenter1]

Anybody got any juicing apples for sale or know where I might get some?

The frosts in May have left me with hardly any fruit. I need dessert apples preferably, some Discovery and or Katy would be a start but main season is what I was really after.
I expect I will need 15 ton or more to make my crop up but a ton here and there would help. Can collect, can supply bins, might even be able to pick some I am that desperate.
Cheshire based but not expecting anything local.
A pointer to someone that might have some would help too.

We will have juicing apples available. Kent is a fair trek from Cheshire though.

I am looking for some juicing apples and cider apples, I am in south devon, so close the better. Couple of ton of each. Obviously not until new season September time.

 

[Fruitbat]

Apples in Cheshire? Are Eddisbury Fruit Farm still going?
Cider apple wise I believe there will be plenty available, with pubs having been shut there's not much need no brew a lot this year. Quite a lot going to AD from what I hear.

 

[Kidds]

Apples in Cheshire? Are Eddisbury Fruit Farm still going?
Cider apple wise I believe there will be plenty available, with pubs having been shut there's not much need no brew a lot this year. Quite a lot going to AD from what I hear.

Eddisbury themselves not still, going retired and sold most of it but some of the orchards were bought and are still there.

Still haven't found any for myself, was thinking a couple of ton of Katy might help to start with. Makes a nice enough juice and thought some cider growers may have some.
By all means throw some names at me for a starting point. I don't know any apple growers as they are a bit thin on the ground up here.

 

[aidan]

Apple grower here would be very interested too

Im at the other end of the country but we have a few apple trees for ourselves

How do you keep the birds away from the apple trees from now on ?

 

[fendt208v]

We use gas bangers mostly, also use scarecrows or kites tied to the trees. But it still only goes so far, the birds still cause damage.

 

[Devil's advocate]

Im at the other end of the country but we have a few apple trees for ourselves

How do you keep the birds away from the apple trees from now on ?

How about hazel nuts, how on earth do they protect those