Year-Round Orchard
(Continued from Pag* A 23)
During the height of apple
harvest season up to 15,000 gal
lons of cider are made each day.
All cider, which consists of several
varieties of sweet and tart apples,
is sold on the premises.
Drought affects crops
This year’s apple harvest was
affected by the extreme tempera-
es pressed and filtered through the cheesecloth go straight to a storage tank
before being bottled as cider. The application of pressure must be carefully monitored
because pressure applied too quickly makes the cheesecloth split and sends apple
sauce flying. Stuart Constable, production manager, and a worker watch the press.
tures and dryness. “We started out
okay, but the apples matured late.
This year we didn’t have enough
labor to pick the apples, so the
mature ones fell, bruising others
on the way down,” David said.
In addition, Highland Orchard
lost half of its Stayman apple crop
when rains came after the dry
spell. “The apples cracked because
the skin wouldn’t stretch to accom-
modale the swelling when the
apples filled with water,”
explained David. The apples
couldn’t even be salvaged by using
them in cider because they were
immature and therefore too
starchy.
Due to a lot of irrigation. High
land Orchard didn’t experience
great losses as a result of the
drought. “Our blueberry crop was
our worst crop,” said David. “But
that was due more to a wet inr
Lancaster Farming, Saturday, November 26,1988-A27
awl. ,>s applesauce onto cheesecloth. Mu< .skill
is required to do this, as too much will cause the cheese
cloth to burst when in the press.
than the drought. It was wet and
windy during pollination, which
made pollination hard.”
Although the orchard was irri
gated, The staff did have to do a lot
of thinning so that the remaining
fruit would be of good size.
Their beginnings
The Hodges’ grandparents
began the orchard and when their
parents took over in the mid 19505,
the family hauled peaches and
apples to Wilmington, where they
were distributed along with their
grandparents’ fruit crops. Also
during this time, they began farm
to-store delivery.
“We quit that in the late ’6os
though,” commented David. “It
didn’t work well. We found that a
store would order a certain variety
or quantity and then not want it
when we delivered.”
Instead the Hodges switched to
pick-your-own harvesting and
developed bigger contracts. “We
went from delivering 10 boxes per
store to 10,000 per chain. To make
this transition, we pooled resour
ces with other area orchards,”
explained David.
Highland Orchard supplied
apples and packing equipment
while the other orchards supplied
additional apples and the labor.
The orchard also erected a small
retail stand in their packing area.
As Highland developed new
markets and made bigger connec
tions, the other orchards dropped
out of the packing operation. “As
we began to offer more and more
fruits and vegetables, it became
impractical to haul,” said David.
So that curtailed and instead the
retail operation was expanded.
The current building has been
expanded two times and a bakery
was added in the mid 19705. This
year the bakery began offering
fresh bread.
Along with the growth of the
orchard, another type of business
was bom: construction equipment
leasing.
“The opportunity was available
to us and we took advantage of it,”
explained David. “If we counted
on agriculture, we wouldn’t be
here, it’s as simple as that.”
The Hodges initially purchased
trucks and various other pieces of
equipment to use in the orchards:
gradually they began leasing their
equipment in the off season. Bruce
Hodge runs this operation for the
orchard.