What's New At Minnesota Harvest

Our "Pickin' in the Dark" live music series that started in October of 2004 resumes on July 15, 2005! We'll be presenting popular national recording artists weekly in July, August, and September. Friday nights will feature live Classic Rock or Modern Rock while Saturday nights will showcase live Country music. Last year's Country performers included Blue County (2004 CMA Award nominee), Nitty Gritty Dirt Band (2004 Grammy winner), Lorrie Morgan, Emerson Drive, Rick Monroe, and Trick Pony (2004 CMA Award nominee). Almost all of them will be returning, and others will be announced soon. Without exception, the shows were really great. Our set-up is unique, and there's a feeling you get when you see and hear live music at this orchard that just makes it special. The bands are feeling it, too. Please check out the reviews from 2004 on our website at http://www.minnesotaharvest.net/bluecounty.htm. We'll be posting the 2005 schedule very soon.

Horseback riding is happening on our outstanding bluff-top trails seven days a week year 'round, and the main season is coming up as summer weather arrives and school lets out. We've already had a lot of excellent rides. More info at http://www.minnesotaharvest.net/horse.htm

APPLES: We sold the last of the 2004 crop on May 15, 2005. Our Golden Earl apples (a variety we bred here at Minnesota Harvest) were excellent until the end. We'll start picking the new crop on July 23, 2005. That'll be here soon! Then one variety will follow another, so apples will be available for picking from July 23 until early November, and we'll sell them in the Apple Lodge until May 15 of 2006. You can see the list of apple varieties and dates of availability (plus write-ups on many of them) at http://www.minnesotaharvest.net/apples.htm

We had many nights of freezing or near freezing nights at blossom time in late April and early May, 2005, but it doesn't look like it will impact our apple crop. We've had lots of rain, which isn't always convenient, but it is giving us an excellent start as far as growing apples is concerned.

He immediately came out to the orchard with a cameraman and filmed a story, which led off the 10 O'clock News. Even the teasers leading up to the news were orchard shots and bee shots. They did a good job and reported accurately. I'm not a sound-byte type of guy, as we know, so they had to edit to what they considered high points. There's no way, though, to explain what's all going on in a sound byte.

They showed as I cut open a damaged apple and an undamaged apple. I think that was very educational for folks who don't hang around apples. They filmed bee hives flying like crazy, but working on dandelions because apple blossom has passed. I reported that we had a full day of bee flight on Sunday, May 8 when the trees were in full bloom and then no flying at all until Sunday, May 15, when there were about three hours in the afternoon but not all that much bloom left to pollinate. But we're confident we got pollinated successfully in that short time because we own 300 to 600 of our own beehives (twenty-five would be sufficient to pollinate our entire crop in a normal year), which we overwintered in California, pollinating first almonds and then oranges. Since the oranges weren't done blooming by the time blossoms started to come on in Minnesota, we nearly missed our bloom opportunity here with the apples. But we unloaded the bees on Friday, May 6 and had that tremendous day on May 8, so we're very fortunate. We hadn't lost any bees due to parasites, and they were here in perfect timing and in huge numbers to take advantage of a very very limited pollination window.

I demonstrated for the news crew that it appears like we are setting a potentially full crop of apples. Right now, we're looking at apples of about 6 millimeters in size. All of the apples I've checked that are that size or larger are in perfect condition. I believe that none of the damaged apples would continue to grow as large as that. So it's pretty easy to view on a walk-by that there are viable apples in quantity.

All apple growers know that apple trees produce many times the number of apples they can carry all the way to harvest time. There is a "June drop" that occurs naturally every year in June in which the tree aborts a great number of them. The damaged apples we lost here this spring are no more important than those that the trees would eliminate in the June drop anyway, so we won't miss them. The important thing is that there seems to be enough for a full crop.

But then there could be hail storms, or high winds, or diseases, or insects. Or harvest-time disasters like an early freeze or poor ripening conditions. So you really never know until a crop is picked.

We've only had two short crops in our 35 years, so we have been extremely fortunate!
--Submitted by Topper Sponsel 5/22/2005