We've almost finished harvesting all remaining 'Enterprise' apples now, and should pick the rest later this
week. 'GoldRush' apples will keep ripening on the trees for the next 2
weeks or so, and customers can pick
their own 'GoldRush' apples from now to about Nov. 12 or 14. We have many harvested 'Enterprise' and 'GoldRush'
apples for sale now and for the next 8 months or so, until late
June.
We're expecting a very good crop of pecans this year. We just started
harvesting pecans, and just started cleaning and cracking the pecans for
sale. We now have cracked 'Osage' pecans for sale. Cracked 'Kanza'
pecans should start in late Nov. once we get a hard freeze of 26 F or
lower. We should have cracked pecans for sale until late June.
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| 'Osage' pecans, our earliest-ripening pecan variety, are now cracked and ready for sale. |
It requires 5 different machines to harvest
pecans and prepare them for sale. First, Bill uses a tractor-pulled
stick rake to remove fallen branches from the pecan orchard floor. Next
he uses a tractor-mounted trunk shaker to shake pecans from the trees.
Then he drives a self-propelled pecan harvesting machine, which scoops
up the pecans from the ground with rubber fingers, over the orchard.
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| Yesterday Bill used our tractor-mounted trunk shaker to shake pecans from trees near our house. Our main 20-acre pecan planting is in the background on Neosho River floodplain land. |
With the wet weather lately, we have to place newly-harvested pecans on drying racks for a few days before cleaning and cracking them. Then Bill runs the dried, harvested pecans through a cleaning machine, and finally he runs cleaned pecans through the pecan cracking machine and blower. Then he scoops cracked pecans into bags by hand and weighs them.
Pecan prices are explained in the previous blog post, and prices for apples are detailed in the blog post before that (scroll down). For payment, we accept cash or checks, but NO credit cards or debit
cards. Please bring your checkbook or enough cash to cover the amount
of apples and pecans you'll buy.
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| The 'Brandywine' red maple trees I planted 6 years ago to shade the sales building still have beautiful fall color now. |
We're still open our fall hours until Nov. 30: open
9:00 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. Mon.-Sat., and Sundays 1:00 p.m. to 5:30
p.m. On cold or rainy days, I'm in the sales building, sorting the apples we have harvested. I'm usually out harvesting apples, so I put a sign on the
sales building post to ring the bell for service. Ring it loudly,
once or twice, and I'll hear it and come to the sales building.
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| Looking south from the sales building, past a 'Brandywine' red maple, our thornless blackberry bushes are developing their fall colors. |
