Shelling Pecans

Saturday I was finally over the flu, so when D returned from a local pecan cracker with 10 pounds of cracked beautiful Desirables (that's a pecan variety :) !) we all sat on the back porch, spread them on the plastic tablecloth and shelled them. After weighing them into 1-pound bags, we delivered our first "prize" to friends and neighbors, reserving some in our fridge for soon-to-come Thanksgiving pies! The nuts were grown in an irrigated orchard in northern Georgia and make us even more excited about getting our trees in the ground and growing.

We pick up our first tree order next Saturday from Lake View Pecans in Bailey. D is taking Friday through the whole next week off to dig 3' wide, 4' deep holes at each tree spot with a rented bobcat with a 3' auger attachment. We will then hand mix lime into the soil (just a small amount) before refilling the hole, then he will subsoil both across and down each row which should break up any "glazing" done by the auger. After the subsoiling is done, we will use the tractor to smooth out the rows and will then replace each measured marker for the exact center of the hole. Our plan is to then be able to simply use manual post hole diggers for the hole and planting of each pot. We will probably try to get all of the NC trees (85 of them, 4 different varieties) in the ground before Christmas, but definitely by New Years. I will hand water and tend to the trees in the pots between this Saturday and the day they go into the ground. After New Years we will be going to Texas to get the rest of the trees (385 total but just two varieties). That's the plan. We will see what reality brings :) !

Fruit and Berry Order

This past week I ordered a few more fruit and berry trees/plants for our fruit orchard (just to the Northwest side of the pecan orchard). We currently have plums, pears, peaches, apples, figs, blueberries and grapes for our personal consumption. The new order will add two more varieties of apples (Winesap and Granny Smith) to cross-pollinate with the Red and Yellow Delicious trees we have. The one Arkansas Black tree we have has never done well and we are going to attempt to dig it up and replant it when we rent the auger during Thanksgiving week. We will also dig the holes for the new fruit/berries that will arrive Dec. 12th. In addition to the two apple varieties we order one each of four kinds of muscadine grapes, more Arapaho and Navaho thornless blackberries (these are fantastic tasting, easy to pick - thornless!!!! - and grew extremely well both last year during the record-breaking drought as well as the almost wet summer this year. ) I sure am hoping to be able to make lots and lots of blackberry pies and jam soon (we ate all of this year's crop fresh except for one pie). I decided not to order any more blueberry or fig plants but try to really prune and carefully tend the ones we have already. I also opted out of more pear or plum trees since we had very ample crops of both this year, even though the trees are still very young. If I decide to make for gifts or sales more preserves from these we can add a tree or two in a few years.

Layout finished (hopefully!)

Saturday we finished (hopefully!) the exact layout of the orchard, hand placing 362 flags in rows and columns up and down the hills to be ready for digging holes for the trees on the main portion of the farm. We still need to measure and flag the areas that will flank the drive, but that is a very easy task comparatively speaking. I was scheduled to take the two new soil samples we have (from the two areas where the millet didn't grow very well) to the CoOp Extension office in Smithfield today but Ethan has the flu, so we will hopefully go tomorrow or Wed., and take the tractor's radiator and fan to a "specialist" in Garner who will tell us whether it can be resurrected or we will have to buy a new one (over $400!).

The layout now includes:
235 Pawnee
12 Oconee
85 Desirable
15 Cape Fear
25 Stuart
9 Nacano
15 Sumner

(Shoshoni wasn't available from our suppliers so I have just left it out since we had more than sufficient of other varieties.) Here are my notes for choice of varieties and their location on the farm:
1 - Have enough varieties to withstand our "northern" conditions, including possibility of both drought and humid summers, early warm periods followed by potential late frosts, soil conditions, comparatively low wind speeds in spring when pollination is needed, potential for high damaging hurricane winds, rolling topography, minimum amount of topsoil, and natural pH and pests. We have set a minimum of 4 and maximum of 10 varieties, with the maximum due to the desire to have as consistent size, shape and color as possible between varieties.
2 - Have enough varieties to have some nuts maturing over several weeks, rather than all at once, in order to spread out the ability to utilize human resources and minimum amount of harvesting equipment, as well as spread out the availability of new product direct to the public for the longest amount of time, but preferably all before Thanksgiving.
3 - Have some temporary rows with varieties that are quicker (5-7 years as opposed to 8-12 years old) to come into production.
4 - Have mostly varieties that are at least moderately resistant to pecan scab, but balance the need for resistance to scab with propensity to break limbs, alternate bear, shell thickness, and tolerance to drought.
As you can see, the variables are almost endless and at the end of the day, we had to also consider the availability of the variety from a reliable resource. Their is no "perfect" choice because their is no perfect soil, or perfect weather pattern, or perfect world! But we have tried to consider as many factors as possible, and weigh each according to its value or distraction from what we want to accomplish with limited financial and labor resources. I'm sure in years to come we might play the "if only" game about varieties and layout, but we've done our best with as much information as we could get and with as much discussion with growers and between ourselves as we could. So for now,I have updated the spreadsheet, kept notes, and re-confirmed that our order this spring will give us more than sufficient of each variety. Actually, I really will miss this part, because it's like a big jigsaw puzzle and anyone who knows me knows I LOVE puzzles!!