Dear Vohd,
Thank you for performing the kindest act that anyone has done for me in recent memory. My morning started bright and early, and the knowledge that a Winblo peach tree may indeed be obtainable brightened my day. My day, thought not so different than any other day, was brightened by your provision of this little nugget of information. Tonight I shall rest contented, knowing that I need wait only a few more months before I meet a genuine Winblo peach tree.
Thank you for being wonderful!
Olpea
I bet your ready to eat peaches are great! Do you sell every day of the week? Since we are only open two days a week we are working to improve our picking and selling process. We did get our old cooler working and tested our ability to carry peaches for a few days and it worked great. Also tested U-pick peaches. We had a lot of family with young kids picking without much extra volume given the amount of extra work. Next year will be our second production year on the peaches and we are going to have a lot more peaches to sell. U-pick would help, if we could do it without a lot of damage and loss of fruit.
Blueberry,
Sounds like you are doing very well. We do sell every day of the week. Weāve been doing 4 farmerās markets a week and sell at the farm gate when we arenāt at a farmerās market.
We donāt have any refrigeration, but we sure could use some.
When our refrigeration equipment died, we replaced it with a coolbot controller and a 12K BTU Ac unit. The combination will keep the temp of our 6 X8 cooler to low 40ās. We did not want to spend a lot of money to replace the refrigeration equipment. and the coolbot and AC unit was a lot cheaper.
That was much more than the post deserved, but itās much appreciated, nonetheless. You might want to check with VVA about what rootstock they are offering it on and consider grafting it if itās not one that is well-suited to your locale. I think there is a fair chance that the CRFG scion exchange will have it this year. Itās a good peach.
Blueberryā¦how old are those B9 Goldrush trees in your photo, and what is your āfor realā yield from each of them in terms of pounds harvested?
Do you spray a herbicide between rows? I see a lot of nice green grass clusters interspersed with areas of dead or dry growth. Do you irrigate, and if so, what is the water source? What are the strings in the photo forā¦are you pulling things straight, or pulling limbs down?
Those posts at 50ā spacing would never make it here in the mountains in a heavy clingy snowstorm with high winds. I hope it proves adequate for you, and I think it will, without the snow cover and high winds. It would be something that worried me though. Those B9ās look less like trees and more like tall tomato plants, but I know that seems to be the big thing now.
Did you hand dig all the holes for these trees all at once or did you drill or trench plow them in?
What kind of price does the NC farm market pay per lb. for your Goldrush and whatever other varieties you supply? What is the better ROIā¦pommes or stonefruit?
What all do you offer in terms of things for saleā¦do you do row crop sales as well? Do you have a āsalesā building or roadside stand or what? Was insurance required? What is the nearest major city to you and how far away is it?
Why exactly are you open just two days a weekā¦did that provide the best ROI in your case? Do you employ labor to help harvest? Do you have any person employed to aid in sales or in any other tasks?
Sorry to ask so many open and pointed questions, but Iām really interested in this. You can reply to me in private if you like or not at all and Iāll understand. Iām just trying to get my head around all this.
Finally bluberry (and Olpea) what would be the single word of advice (or caution) to someone who was considering a similar business model as your own?
Olpea, please feel free to answer alsoā¦your opinion is ( particularly in this case) of the highest value to me.
Iām sure you are curious as to my reasons for asking these questionsā¦pm me. Iād like to talk with each of you.
Sorry for my forward questions, but I can only guess at all the things I DONāT know compared to you and Olpea. Be cool if you guys could toss out a word of caution and prevent some dummy like me fom making costly and unnecessary mistakes.
Thank you both in advanceā¦no matter.
Blueberry and Olpea, Please answer Appleseeds forward questions, I would love to know too!
Appleseed
We are located about 15 miles east of Greensboro, NC. I estimate well over a million people live within 30 miles of our farm. Our area is often referred to as Tobacco Road, based on the large amount of tobacco that used to be grown here.
The Goldrush were 2 years old when the picture was taken. After the fireblight outbreak, I had to chop them up and I was advised not to fruit the trees this year, but force the trees to grow in order to have good crop next year. We have big hopes for the apples next year.
Yes I spray herbicide down the rows but I mow the row middles. Drip irrigation on everything - 1 GPH emitters. Irrigation divided into 5 zones with water provided by household well. (8 GPM.)
No row crops. All sold from a 24X24 farm stand we remodeled a few years ago. At the moment only blueberry, blackberry , some peaches and flowers. Open Wednesday and Saturday, 7-12. We have as few as about 25 customers and as many as 125 on a busy Saturday (about 1 customer every 2 minutes) I picked most of the 3 year old peach trees this year and my wife makes some flower arrangements. All of the berries, most of the flowers are U-pick. Tried some U-pick on the peaches and will have to do a lot more next year. Expect the apples will be mostly u-pick. No Apple sales so far,except for a few in year 1 of the first 200 trees. We only have about 4-5 acres of stuff total. We have no labor, just my wife and myself. My son from out of town visits and helps out during the busy July 4 week. We rely on our web page (www.blueberrythrillfarm.com) and facebook along with a few road signs and word of mouth to pull the customers. You may find the more detailed info and pictures on the webpage useful.
I tied the branches down on the apples at first but found weights to be faster and better
Since Iām new to Apples and Peaches, Iām not qualified to give advice on those topics but we have grown blueberry/blackberry for 30 years and Iām comfortable giving advice on those.
Donāt underestimate the difficulty of selling what you grow. Selling what you grow is the real key to success. It sounds trivial, but it is CRITICAL. You have to find a selling model that fits your situation and your customerās needs. Also, as a small grower you need to sell retail. We tried selling wholesale but it was too much work for the amount of profit. Donāt underestimate the startup costs involved or the amount of time required to hit moderate production levels. Everything cost more than you expect and takes longer than you expect to get into production. 10K/acre is a good revenue target, but if you can figure out how to sell 90% of what you grow at a retail price, the potential is higher.
I would agree with everything Blueberry just posted. Everything is more expensive than you think.
As I made the transition from a part-time backyard grower to a full time grower I underestimated the time and expense for the larger orchard. When doing everything part-time, one tends to underestimate the amount of labor it takes because you can go out there and put an extra hour or two of labor at night to get caught up. With a larger orchard, that doesnāt work.
Just picking and selling is practically full time during the summer. Itās hard to find time to mow, spray or summer prune peaches.
Peaches are iffy here from a commercial perspective. The Missouri ext. says a third of the time is a complete crop failure, one third is partial crop and one third is full crop. I think thatās about right. I would never have a peach orchard here if I had to depend on it for our sole source of household income.
You guys need some fruit interns 
, as a city boy, I find this stuff fascinating, good luck to you both.
Thatās a good idea, Iām thinking students from the local Ag college, Maybe show them live small scale operations. Plus the University may offer you good advice, hands on advice.
Maybe have an experimental crop for them to care for from seed to sale. At least ask if any trials or research on peaches you could help with.
Thanks Moley. I have a friend who also has a commercial peach orchard within driving distance. He hires interns and seems to do well with them.
His peach orchard is about 3X the size of mine, which helps scale things.
Most of our sales have been through farm markets. Weāve done about 4 per week which keeps us very busy.
I think itās a bit easier to sell at the farm gate than in Blueberrys state of SC, which is the #2 state of peach production. KS/MO doesnāt grow many peaches, so if you have some decent ones, they pretty much sell themselves. The biggest challenge for us is to produce a good crop of good peaches.
Location of the orchard should also be considered. One should look not only at production issues (like air drainage) but also how much road traffic is present. Donāt let a dream/vision cloud your reason through rose colored glasses. Believe me, fruit growing is hard work and a tough business. Most orchards here have folded, because there is more money in other industries for the same skill set/investment required.
Iām glad I grow trees for money and not fruit and also glad that my nursery operation need only generate about 20% of the total income. My low spray approach would not function if I was selling fruit for āprofitā. This year Iād also have to net everything from birds, which I probably wouldnāt have budgeted for. There is adequate anxiety in growing fruit as a hobby- I go crazy with losses even while ending up with more fruit than I can give away. Every work day I go out with bags of fruit now to give to customers that might not have anything yet or are between harvests. Even this sucks time like a water spout. I spend a lot of time trying to pick stonefruit at the perfect point of ripeness- each one gets a gentle squeeze before being lifted from the tree.
Thereās no business like show business.
Alan is correct about the āshow business.ā Agritourism is also a form of show business. Its big business and getting bigger. Many customers view their trip into the country to pick berries as entertainment. As a result, some growers focus on entertainment rather than farming. We do not. Our business model centers around the production of quality local fruit, not entertainment. However, we do recognize the entertainment component to U-pick fruit. Corn maze, tractor rides and so forth generate a lot of revenue without a lot of expense and fit well into some small farm programs (not ours).
Our farm operation is about improving my physical and mental health, not profit maximization! Although we make money, I could make more money doing just about anything other than growing fruit.Fortunately, blueberry and blackberry are now considered health foods which helps a lot. Our web page and facebook help draw customers to the farm. We have made substantial investments in blueberries, blackberries, apples and peaches that could pay off in a big way, but no guarantee.
Here is some āpie in the skyā math for 1 acre of production of 4 crops sold at retail. We are not even close to these numbers. Under the most optimistic scenario only 1/3 to 1/2 of the projection may be attainable. Keep in mind these are gross revenue figures, so you have to subtract all your expenses.
Blackberry 12k pounds at $3/pound = $36,000
Blueberry 8K pounds at $3/pound = $24,000
Peach 15K pounds at $1.50/pound = $22,000
Apple 30K pounds at $1/pound = $30,000yeahā¦30,000 lbs. of apples per acre sounds very optimistic.
The average yield for apple orchards in Virginia a few years ago was estimated at about 700 BU/acre or about 30,000 Lb per acre.
An excellent yield in a high density planting (800-1400 trees/acre) at maturity is 800-1200 Bu/acre. The new benchmark for a good grower in a good climate with a modern orchard is 40K pounds/acre. These yields are required to pay off the larger investment in more trees, trellis system and irrigation compared with standard size trees or even semi-dwarf trees.
I think of my business as being entertainment for the rich- I wasnāt thinking of agri-tourism. People donāt love their fruit just because it is good for them and/or it is so delicious. I think that watching the fruit grow and not knowing how it will turn out creates a level of anticipation difficult for the rich to experience through other venues. Normally any commodity they desire is a few clicks away and at their door within 24 hours. The fruit from their trees they must patiently wait for and hope it all works out. The reward, when it comes, is that much more special for its unpredictability and the growing anticipation as the harvest approaches. An occasional early, flower killing frost is actually probably good for my business.
I do the same with honeybees, the most profitable part of beekeeping for years