I’m not saying everything in this video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3riW_yiCN5E is usable but everyone can take something away from watching it. The video has been around a long time and I already use several tricks from it I learned the hard way. One thing in this video as an example is plant a few trees as apples and some autumn olive (nitrogen fixers & disease resistant) and a couple of pears, peaches etc… By randomizing your planting of trees it breaks a disease or insect in many cases from sweeping through an orchard. As an example imagine you are growing a row in your orchard that is apricot, pear, chestnut, autumn olive, plum, hazelnut, apple, goumi, fig, cherry, English walnut, peach, apple… and start over it’s very difficult for a disease to sweep through an orchard. I didn’t do that but what I do now is when an apple dies I plant a peach in it’s place and when a peach dies I plant an apple in it’s place to create barriers. When a tree dies by disease I avoid problems by switching pome fruit plantings with stone fruit, nut tree, etc. when I replant. You may have experienced or at least read about replanting disease. Planting multiple crops is smart for other reasons such as spring frosts because if you have all apples and frost falls at that time you have no crop at all. If bloom times are staggered it’s very difficult to lose an entire crop on any year. My mother always said don’t put all your eggs in one basket. I’m also not going to say I can raise everything organic because we are definitely not able to do that in this location. Over half of my crops are permaculture design and 100% spray free. Stone fruit are a real problem to raise in my area as are apples and my best attempts at low spray have been failures. Blackberries as an example I’ve raised organically for 20 years and you can see the methods are effective in the results seen here Blackberries by the gallons.
On the general subject, I came back recently from CA where I pruned my sister’s orchard where she recently installed her chicken coop. The unsprayed apples were clean enough for display in a grocery store. Some of this may be due to the warmer and dryer summers they are experiencing in the northwest (she’s on the coast not too far from the Oregon border), but the serious reduction in coddling moth damage may be due to the presence of the chickens. Worms will not survive on the ground there, even if they are inside the flesh of apples.
Interestingly, her hens are not fond of the apples and only eat them when they start to rot (maybe for fly larvae). I have seen northeast chickens scarf down apples with enthusiasm.
Alan,
Never even thought about the chickens eating the coddling moth larvae. Organic apples would be wonderful! Only in California can they do that right ? Weather is likely the key factor.
I’ve often read of using chickens to police the ground in orchards, but this was the first time I’ve had a chance to witness a before and after and it did seem trans-formative, albeit from anecdote only.
I assume they’d be helpful for all worm pests that overwinter under trees anywhere, but I’m wondering if their grain fed poop won’t eventually lead to excessive nitrogen induced growth or nutrient imbalances. The lack of rain during growing season may reduce this as a problem in her climate.
I enjoyed the video.
Thanks for the reminder of the video. i saw it before and it’s quite interesting. What are folks favorite “non-traditional” shrubs and trees for your orchard? I have a fairly diverse area already, not counting the natural wild woods/fields surrounding. But I’d like to add more shrubs/small trees between where I have a number of same type fruit trees (mainly apples). I have Siberian Pea Shrubs and lilacs. Autumn Olives are rampant outside the orchard and not real welcome inside. Looking for some more ideas, fruiting or non-fruiting.
don’t they do this in Washington state to produce organic apples? chickens will eliminate both CM and PC larvae in the ground.
Perhaps you could graft Goumi to the autumn olives. Grapes are another thing I grow that are pretty easy. In areas that get lots of rain kiwi would be nice but take lots of room and a sturdy arbor. There are many other things to do as well such as Aronia, elderberry etc. that are not palatable until mixed with apple juice. Seaberry was the first berry juice in space they claim and would grow well and like autumn olive and Goumi it fixes nitrogen.
Sounds like you have something working for you. I bought my autumn olives in bulk from lawyer nursery. They were supposed to be Goumi and they mislabeled them somehow. We have the same situation where none accidentally sprout. They were very sour and not overly palatable this year. Last year they were wonderful so I’m not sure what the difference was. We cannot go organic here but certainly enjoy less sprays when possible. For the orchadists looking for shrubs such as nanny berry, buffalo berry, American cranberry, etc. oikos sells all types of shrubs, wild fruits etc. https://oikostreecrops.com. It’s a nice nursery and I’ve bought pears etc. from them and was pleased with what I received.
Out of curiosity, if your chickens and such are flying up to your trees, why are you not clipping their wings? (Or are you and they manage to get enough lift anyway?)
Aren’t there certain breeds that are supposed to not really able to fly at all? I know I was looking at getting Minorcas, since they are well-adapted for our climate, but I was kind of deterred by the fact the description said they were able to fly to lower branches of trees and roost in them. (I assumed they said that as a contrast to many other chickens, which I assumed did not do this?)
Just asking out of curiosity as a person who has been debating getting chickens.
My sister clips her chicken’s wings to keep them in the pen but she has the lighter birds. I have Orpington, they are a larger bird and once they reach mature size they cannot lift themselves very well off the ground. Even in the chicken house they like to stay off the roosts and prefer to settle on the floor for the night. But maybe mine just like to stay grounded.
I’ve seen the same thing with buff orphingtons which is why they won’t work in my area of Kansas very well. When we raise chickens coyotes, bobcats, raccoons, possums, dogs etc. find them a much easier meal than pheasant, quail, wild turkey etc… In order to keep chickens I raised black minorocas, white leghorn, Dark Cornish, English game, key west rescue chickens etc… all of which fly high and run like a rabbit when in trouble. Not sure I should bring it up but white leghorn are the best layers in that group and also they are targeted by predators most in that group.
For sure, so our chickens are penned and the only way I could keep them in an orchard was if it was fenced. I did however, keep geese in my peony fields for weed control. It worked very well and they sure made a difference to the re seeding rate of the weeds for the next year. They never touched a peony plant but the loved the canadian thistle, dandelions, sow thistle and portulaca. With a three wire electric fence predators left them alone.
If I had the space I would raise Indian Runner ducks. They are supposedly great for pest control and they are cute.
I have had buffs in the past but I have Lavenders , Blue and Splash now,and I think they may just be lazy 
My fence is not high about up to my shoulders and they never fly out, and as I said, they refuse to roost. I am going on the third year for most of these and nada flight. But yes, of course, all chickens can fly.
the way to make it work in an organic apple production setting is to use meat birds, perhaps with some mothering hen to teach them while they are too young to know how to forage. Large breasted Cornish crosses can not fly.
I have thought of grafting goumis to some autumn olives but our ao’s die back every so often in a cold winter (unfortunately they don’t freeze out completely) so i figure it probably isn’t worth it to graft. It’s nice they aren’t an invasive problem everywhere as they are here. We accept them but i do wish we had never planted them. A few are nice. Hundreds all over aren’t. I’ll have to look into seaberries. I do have grapes and raspberries and blueberries. A happy group.
I use autumn olive as nurse trees for my other fruit trees, planting several in or near the same hole I put my apple or pear. I dig them from where they’ve become naturalized in a nearby field. Let them grow for a few seasons til they are established, then whack back the AO to the ground. Decomposing roots will feed the desired fruit tree. I do the same thing with alder, another nitrogen fixer. My site needs restorative practices to bring back some fertility and diversity to the dense thatch sod.
A couple years back I tried grafting named cultivars of AO and goumi onto my seedlings, most did not take, but this fall I noticed yellow fruit on one graft. They were much larger and better tasting!
I agree that pigs would make a serious mess of an established orchard, I know because I have done it! Next time I would use a breed that was developed for grazing (Idaho pasture pig, kunekune) or nose ringed.
This past year we got ducks, Ancona, Saxony, Silver Appleyard, and once I get my paddock fencing sorted out, I plan to let them pasture in the orchard aisles for pest control and fertilization.
I love the concept of sheep in the orchard, maybe someday when my trees are bigger…
I’ve tried selected varieties from Hidden Springs nursery- I once spent a very pleasurable day with Hector Black at a NAFEX meeting who encouraged me to try them. The selected ones had larger berries than seedlings I tried before but were still much too astringent to be useful to me. They are a presence on my property now but not excessively invasive. They probably are more invasive in poor soils where their ability to fix N would be a strong advantage, but such an ability also requires an extra investment of energy.
I would like to see some research in their efficacy as nurse trees, They might be useful for getting trees started but once fruit trees are of bearing age a steady supply of N is not necessarily a positive. You want it in early spring to feed the fruit (early spur leaves), which is when organically derived N is at an ebb. It is not useful to encourage a rush of vegetative growth in mid-summer in the humid regions with N applications at that time. Because water is needed to create this vegetative surge it is not going to be a real problem in the west.
I think the problem with Autumn Olive here is that it was planted by the hundreds as part of an inexpensive wildlife packet sold and promoted by the local Soil Conservation Service for many years. Not one of their higher moments. But it was way more than local wildlife could keep in balance naturally. They are happy to regrow when frozen or cut down. And they don’t seem particular as to the soil, poor or rich, sun or shade. But maybe I’ll try some grafting goumis in sheltered spots. Lots of plants to experiment with! I do like to think they are helping to enrich the soil.