A Very Happy New Year to all our friends and customers who have supported Gay and I over the past year's purchasing our organic products.
The new fruit season of 2011 has started with us harvesting our first Professor Black cling peaches yesterday and today. With the hot and windy weather predicted for the next few days will mean that the ripening process will  accelerate and we will pick, pack and coldstore in earnest. This year we have decided to present our peaches to you in punnets which we think will overcome bruising and general damage in transportation. We will also be preparing fruit for bottling our peach slices in apple juice and peach jam. We will keep you advised when these products are available.
With regard to pears, the crop is progressing normally and from early predictions we could be harvesting our Bon Rouge and Beurre Hardy in the first week of February. Thereafter they will be followed with Packham's Triumph.
A week or two later we will start with the first apples being Royal Gala followed by Golden Delicious.
The time of actual harvesting by orchard is determined by taking and sending fruit samples to a special laboratory in Elgin where fruit size, ripeness of seeds, conversion of starch to sugar, pressure and other parameters are determined and together with this information and that of the industry the researchers are able to provide us with a window of  pre-optimum, optimum and post-optimum  harvesting dates. We always endeavour to pick a variety during it's optimum period to ensure superb eating quality.
This blog is the beginning of information which we hope to post on a weekly basis to keep you up to date on what is happening on the farm

Happy Holidays

Lorraine Farm is closed for the holidays. Visit us in the new year for updates on farm activity.