Josiah provided this field report from his visit to these orchards in early September.

The growing geographies in New York State and Pennsylvania are reporting lush fruit sets (on the trees), vigorous growth and excellent size, and early indications are also quite good for color and sugar…some of these growers are calling it a “vintage season.” Of course this is bittersweet for certain other growers in some areas, summer storms brought some pretty serious hail through the orchards back in July and August and a fair number of growers are reporting some fairly serious damage as they get closer to harvest. This is, naturally, never good for anybody.

But for those who managed to get through those hail-storms with little or no impact, it’s going to be a pretty solid season…we expect to see some of the classic, heirloom varietals (‘york imperial’, ‘northern spy’, ‘empire’ etc.)…and there should be plenty of ‘honeycrisp’ to go around!

Have you ever wondered how we determine the sweetness of a fruit is or if it’s ripe enough for shipping?

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Our relationship with Great Lakes Glads, a family-owned and operated farm, has really grown over the last four to five seasons. The Mayer family has refined planting and cutting schedules to such a high degree of efficiency that they can fill truckloads each day…at peak production (roughly June until early October) they can cut, cool, sort, bunch and pack half-a-million stems EVERY DAY! And on a really crazy day, three-quarters-of-a-million stems!

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I just visited Ron Cottle, one of the better conventional and “emerging organic” growers (and long-time vendor/partner with Whole Foods Market) in Eastern North Carolina and took a bunch of pictures to share. He is just about wrapped-up with organic and conventional blueberries and is just now starting his blackberry harvest (they’re awesome!), and in about 8 to 10 days will be full-speed ahead with his organic grape tomatoes.

This block of about 10 contiguous acres just came to full organic certification this season, and he’s pretty excited about it. Read the rest of this entry »