Orchard People

[00:00:00] Introduction and Disclaimer
The following program does not necessarily represent the views and opinions of Reality Radio 101, its advertisers and sponsors, or its listening audience. Listener discretion is advised.
[00:00:17] Welcome to the Urban Forestry Radio Show
Welcome
to the Urban Forestry Radio Show brought to you by the Community Orchard Network. In this monthly podcast, I'm going to take you on a journey. We'll learn about fruit trees, permaculture, food forests, And so much more. So if you're a gardener and enjoy growing your own food, if you love trees, and especially fruit trees, or if you're just interested in living a more sustainable life, You've come to the right place.
I'm Susan Poizner, your host for today. So get ready, roll up your sleeves and let's dig in to today's episode.
Welcome to the Urban Forestry Radio Show with your host, Susan Poizner, right here on Reality Radio 101 to contact us live today with your questions. Send Susan an email. Our email address is instudio101@gmail.com.
And now, your host of the Urban Forestry Radio Show, Susan Poisner. Hi, everyone. Welcome to the show.
[00:02:05] Exploring Superfoods
Today, we're going to talk a little bit about superfoods. So what is a superfood? Well, these are nutrient rich foods that are packed with vitamins and minerals. And experts say that these foods can boost human health.
The problem is that many of these amazing foods come from faraway lands. Some of them are freeze dried and powdered, and they can be very expensive to buy. For instance, Antioxidant rich acai berries come from the Amazon rainforest. Or, fertility boosting maca powder is grown in the mountains of Peru. You can get a small bag of each of these for about 22.
They're quite an investment. Honestly, I think most fruits and vegetables are superfoods, if we eat enough of them. They give us vitamins and minerals, fiber, and lots more. But there are some foods that are so packed with nutrients that they do stand out from the rest.
[00:03:14] Introduction to Seabuckthorn
One of those foods is seabuckthorn berries.
They're nutrient rich and amazingly They're also easy and cheap to grow in North America. Today I'm going to talk to Saskatchewan based researcher Bill Schroeder, who's devoted much of his career to breeding seabuckthorn varieties. We'll talk about the history of the plant and we'll learn how to grow it.
Now, while Bill Schroeder from Saskatchewan is busy developing new plants to put out into the world, Joanie Cooper from Oregon Is busy saving old cultivars. Joanie is the president of the Temperate Orchard Conservancy. And her non profit organization is working to save America's largest private collection of apple trees by cloning each tree.
To, and planting the clones in a new orchard. And by the way, there are 4, 500 different varieties in that orchard. We'll hear her story in the second half of the show. But first, let's learn about Seabuckthorn.
[00:04:22] Interview with Bill Schroeder
On the line, I have Bill Schroeder, a research scientist from Agriculture and Agri Food Canada's SWIFT Current Research and Development Centre in Indian Head, Saskatchewan.
Bill, how are you today? Oh, we lost Bill. Okay, Bill is coming up. In the meantime I've got here some questions that we're going to pose for Bill. So, I put out on Facebook some questions for people to explore how are you doing with growing your seabuckthorn. And I got so many responses on Facebook.
There are some questions about seabuckthorn. Can it grow in the shade, for instance? And seabuckthorn also has male and female plants. So, can you grow one without the other, and will you get fruit? Other questions include, does seabuckthorn grow in climates as warm as California, for instance? So, we're going to find out all the, we're going to explore all these questions, and find out many, many more answers in the show today.
Alright, let's see what's going to happen. Oh, we are just reaching out for Bill, who we lost on the line.
Oh, here we go.
Hi Bill, are you on the line?
Bill? Yes, I'm here. Oh yay, we lost you for a second. I don't know if you were listening, you got a sneak preview of some of the questions that we're going to ask in the show today. I missed some of them, but I've got some of them, yeah. That's okay, we'll talk about all of them. But first of all, I would love you to tell me about the seabuckthorn berries.
Why are they considered a superfood? Well, I think there's a, there's a couple of reasons why they're, considered to be that, but I think, I think the main thing is that, as you mentioned earlier, that it's about the most nutritious and vitamin rich of all berries that you can find pretty much throughout the world.
It's got a very high content of antioxidants, particularly vitamin C, tacopherols, carotenes, and flavonoids. In addition to that, they, they, they package all of these, these different, phytochemicals into one small fruit package. So, not only does the C. bacterium provide, you know, many health promoting, nutritious values through its berries, but also its seed has some very, very, useful essential fatty acids that can be used mainly for skin care and those types of things.
So it's a, it's a, a very powerful, berry product that, that contains a lot of very useful. phytochemicals. Well, it's, that's quite exciting. So how is it that you came to work on seabuckthorn plants and develop them? How did that story begin? Well, it, there's a bit of a history to it. I, I'm, I'm a plant collector, and have been, on many expeditions, mainly to very northern climates of Siberia and northern China.
And in 1985, I was on a seed collection mission looking for different types of, of tree and shrub species for use in shelter belts. And as we were traveling throughout the Siberian countryside, I noticed these huge areas and acreages, acres of, of orange, of orange buried shrubs. So I, I finally had to get them to stop the, the Jeep and we got out and we had a look at these.
These plants and, and I had instantly recommended, recognized them as seabuckthorn, which was a plant we've been growing in the Canadian prairies probably since the 1950s for, for shelter belts, and other revegetation type projects. So we had never thought them as a fruit, fruit, producing shrub. We thought the more as a, a shrub that could be used to stabilize soil.
But what I found when I was in Siberia was that the, the Russian government was planting extensive acreages of this, of this plant to supply, fruit concentrate for use in their space program. So what was happening is the cosmonauts were, were taking seabuckthorn extract into space with them, both as an ointment to, to, to put on their skin and to, Prevent radiation or UV radiation burn, but also as a food supplement because of its high nutritious, content.
So, so that got me very interested. Well, this is a shrub that we can, we grow very well in Canada. And, and it's got these, these very, very unique characteristics that we really hadn't. Hadn't thought of before and I sort of thought of, you know, I can relate the sort of the rise of seabuckthorn after that visit, sort of like, you know, a talented performer or artist that that sort of worked in obscurity for many years.
But, finally, it's going to become an overnight success. And so I thought, well, that might just happen with seabuckthorn. and once, if it's brought to the North American market. So, so you brought back seeds or cuttings, I guess, from Siberia? Well, to begin with, I, I, the first, my first trip, I, I just brought back memories and what I'd seen.
My next trip, which was, two years later to the same area, I had made arrangements to actually specifically meet with some of the seabuckthorn, breeders in, in Russia, and made arrangements then with them to provide me with some germplasm in the form of seed that I would bring back to Canada, and that was the start of what It began as a, 25 year long breeding program.
[00:10:46] Challenges and Successes in Seabuckthorn Cultivation
Now you worked on this amazing for 25 years, you were developing different varieties of seabuckthorn, but Bill, what was wrong with just planting the seeds here and using the Russian, varieties? Well, I, I think there's, there's a couple of things there. One, one is that seabuckthorn is dioecious. So the male and female plants are separate, of course.
And. If you're planting just seeds, as we were doing in shelter belts for all those years, you get about a 50 50 ratio of male and female plants. So planting seedlings for fruit production isn't the most efficient use of, of the, of the area. Now, the other thing with the, the Russian cultivars that have been developed, and they were very well adapted to that area of Siberia, and, and some of the, the varieties that I did bring back with me to test in, in the prairies did fairly well.
But, I I really thought that we needed to have a Canadian developed and fully adapted Seabuckthorn varieties that, that Saskatchewan and Alberta and Manitoba and for that matter, Canadian growers could adapt. Say, this plant was developed for our use, it's specific for our needs, and they could use that as an opportunity to mark a Canadian bred and developed seabuckthorn plant.
So when you were developing these plants, what qualities were you looking for? Bigger berries or longer, you know, I don't know. What were the qualities you were hoping to imbue into these plants? Well, breeding for a larger Berry is not that difficult. it's just a matter of selecting, individuals with large berries.
And, and so it's a fairly easy task. So, so we very quickly got some very large fruited plants. Now, as the name Seabuckthorn tells you it can be a very thorny plant. So this was the, this was the, area that I really focused my breeding program on, was to trying to develop a large fruited, thornless variety.
And to do that, I needed to conduct many different crosses, using many different parental lines, to try to bring forward some of the genes that were, that would develop a thornless, plant. And what I found is that the, the gene for thornlessness really came from the male plant. So when I was identified thornless male plants, I could very regularly transfer that thornless gene into the, into the, the female plant using the, the gene that's coming from the male.
So how many different varieties did you develop over the 25 years? Well, I think, I think when I, when I think of varieties that I released, I ended up releasing four varieties. But to get to that four varieties, we screened over 25, 000 individual genotypes. and from there we went to about 120 promising, individual cultivars.
And from that, those 120 promising cultivars, we ended up with four cultivars that were officially released, and are available to growers. Okay, and what are those cultivars? Well, they're, the first one that we released was called Harvest Moon. the second was Orange September. And the, the third was Autumn Glow, and the last one is Prairie Sunset.
And, and for instance, if I were, was thinking of planting, Seabuckthorn, how would I choose? What's the difference, in general between these varieties? Well, they all have very large fruit. They all have, are, are quite sweet. So if you, we measure sweetness in bricks, so the, the bricks value would be greater than 10.
for all four varieties. What really separates them, I think, is mainly their, their mature, or when they mature, when their fruit is ripe. Harvest Moon is, matures fairly early. Orange September is fairly late, and Prairie Sunset and Autumn Glow are somewhat in between. And when I say mature, the difference in maturity might be up to three to four weeks.
Oh! So if Harvest Moon is maturing In mid August, which it does in Saskatchewan, Orange September would be maturing in probably the first, first week of September. So there's quite, quite a range of time between when the Well, how long it takes for the fruit to reach the point where you want to harvest it.
So that's great for somebody who's thinking of starting a small orchard and that means that they can be supplying these berries to Manufacturers or to the public for quite a few months. Yes, and that that's you know I must a big supporter of diversity in an orchard and and having sort of cultivars that are Certainly not identical, but will give you these opportunities to extend your, your harvest season and, and also I find that, that, by doing that, you, you have a better handle on any, any, management of any diseases and insect pests that, that may occur, although I must say that, that C.
buckthorn has very, we've found very few insect and disease problems, in Canada. compared to what I've seen in Europe and in, in, in Russia. Hmm. Okay, so you, you, over the years you released these varieties. Did it take off right away? Was it the overnight success that you dreamed of? Not really. Yeah, I mean, one could have hoped that, you know, that we could get the, the plant material into, into the hands of growers very quickly.
but that didn't happen. It's, It's a small niche market. I found that most, a lot of the nurseries weren't familiar with the plant. there wasn't much ornamental value to it. so there wasn't a lot of interest in propagating on large scale. The other thing that, that growers, when they're planting fruit varieties, they don't want to spend the same amount of money as you would for ornamental plants.
So it was, it was really difficult to convince. propagators that, that they should be growing seabuckthorn. It's sort of the chicken and egg thing, you know. The, you know, growers wanted it, but they, you know, at the time the markets were a little bit soft. They didn't know where they were going to sell them.
so, so the nursery men, well, they, they didn't really have a feel there was a strong enough market to really put a lot of effort into. Now, The nice thing about seabuckthorn is it's very easy to propagate. So, it grows very well from hardwood cuttings as well as softwood cuttings, so it's not a difficult plant to propagate.
So, once nurseries became aware of that, they seemed to, to, to take the, take the lead, and at this time, I think that there are nurseries that are actually producing some of these cultivars. At the same time, however, there is a lot of Of seabuckthorn material that's coming in from, Europe and, and Russia.
not that that's a bad thing, although I, I, I am somewhat concerned of the trans, transmission of some disease and insect, particular disease and insect pests that may, may affect the long term viability of the, of the industry in Canada. as I said before, we're, we've been fortunate that we've been, Able to stay relatively disease and insect free with, with C.
buckthorn. but it's always a concern when you're bringing material in from, from overseas that you may, inadvertently introduce some, some new pests. It's interesting because you say, you know, it started off slow, but I've got to tell you there is a lot of interest right now. At least, here in Ontario you are seeing seabuckthorn, plants in, specialist fruit tree nurseries.
And as I said earlier in the show, there has been a lot of questions, put out for you specifically for this show on Facebook. So there's a lot of people who are very keen to grow, Seabuckthorn. So Bill, we, just in a minute, we are going to have a word from our sponsor.
[00:19:52] Growing and Caring for Seabuckthorn
sponsors, but after that, I would love to get into more detail about how to grow Seabuckthorn, what the plant is like and how to grow it.
Are you okay staying on the line for a few minutes? Oh, most certainly. I just love to talk about Seabuckthorn. That's wonderful. And to our listeners, this is your opportunity to ask Bill questions or to share your experiences with Seabuckthorn. Email your questions to InStudio101. At gmail. com, instudio101 at gmail.
com, you're listening to the Urban Forestry Radio Show on Reality Radio 101. I'm Susan Poizner, and we'll be back! After this short break.
Hey Sally, your garden is looking great today. Thanks Gary, your lawn is looking a little bit dry. Ah, that's okay, it's all going to change. Soon I'm going to plant a fruit tree in my yard. I'm thinking an apple tree or maybe peach. That sounds great, but do you know what you're doing? Well, fruit trees are easy.
You just plant them, water them, and wait for the harvest, right? Actually, that's not quite the case. What? Organic orchardists spend a lot of time protecting their fruit trees from pest and disease problems. Really? And in order to thrive, fruit trees need to be pruned every year. Hmm, I didn't know that.
I'll tell you what, before you buy your tree, why don't you go to orchardpeople. com. You'll learn lots about growing fruit from the blog, and there's a fantastic monthly newsletter with seasonal tips and reminders. Maybe I should check that out. Yeah, then if you really want to move ahead, You can sign up for OrchardPeople.
com's beginner fruit tree care course. So maybe I should hold off on buying my tree today? You got it. The more you know, the better your tree will grow. Sign up for a free membership to OrchardPeople. com today.
Are you new to growing fruit trees? Or perhaps a seasoned expert? Either way, come and join the Community Orchard Network. We are a group of community and home orchardists from across North America who gather through monthly webinars, radio broadcasts like this one, and podcasts. We want to share our experience, deepen our knowledge, and widen the movement.
Join the conversation. Visit www. orchardpeople. com forward slash network to find out more. This message was brought to you by the Baltimore Orchard Project. The following program does not necessarily represent the views and opinions of Reality Radio 101, its advertisers and sponsors, or its listening audience.
Listener discretion is advised.
Welcome back to the Urban Forestry Radio Show with your host, Susan Poizner, right here on Reality Radio 101. To contact Susan live in the studio right now. Email her. Our email address is iinstudio101@gmail.com.
And now, right back to your host of the Urban Forestry Radio Show, Susan Poizner. This is the Urban Forestry Radio Show. And I'm Susan Poizner. Today, I'm chatting with Bill Schroeder, a research scientist from Agriculture and Agri Food Canada's SWIFT Current Research and Development Center in Indian Head, Saskatchewan.
We are talking about a superfood, seabuckthorn berries. They are considered, of course, a wonderful superfood, high in nutrition, and they are easy to grow in much of North America. Bill, are you still on the line with me now? Yes, I sure am. Okay, wonderful. Can you tell me a little bit what the seed buckthorn plant actually looks like?
Okay, well, if you were to come across a garden that has a silver, a silver leaved, umbrella shaped plant that has, in September and August and well into winter, a Lot of very bright orange berries. It's probably a Seabuckthorn. So is this the kind of plant that I would like to sneak into a corner of my backyard garden?
Well, it depends how big your garden is. Seabuckthorn has a habit of spreading by underground. root system. So you plant one plant in several years, you'll have several plants and in 10 years, you'll probably have 15 to 20 plants because in its natural environment, it's a colonizer. So it's a pioneer plant that'll Will grow on a, on a poor, poorly fertile site and will continue to spread to its underground root system.
So I wouldn't necessarily think it would be a good choice for a small backyard. But if you're willing to, to diligently control the, these shoots that are going to come from the root system. It can be a very productive plant and provide you with probably all the seabuckthorn fruit you're going to need.
Now you say to control the spread, how would you do that? Do you have to Very simply by mowing it. Oh, okay. So plant grass around it and, and this is what we do in our orchard, is that we, we plant grass between the rows and we just continually mow the grass at the same time that we're mowing the The, the shoot, shoots that are, are, emerging from the soil at, alongside the, the edge row or the orchard row.
It sounds to me a little bit like raspberries, a little bit like raspberries is right. so it, it can be, it can be aggressive, but it's not something you cannot control. It's so if you just keep on top of it. You can, you can keep them in place. And, and what type of climate zone, can you grow it in?
Well, it's, it's a, it, the species itself, the genus and species is, is very diverse. And it grows, in, in fairly humid seashore environments to very dry continental environments. The varieties that we developed are, are more suited to cold, dry environments. Much like you'd find throughout much of Canada.
for, for more maritime climates, say on the east coast or the west coast, there, there, our varieties may be more susceptible to diseases such as fusarium. Okay, so, so, let's say I find the right place with kind of crummy soil, a dry site, and I plant my seabuckthorn. what kind of care does it need?
Do I need to prune it? Do I need to add nutrition every spring? Well, actually, seabuckthorn doesn't require a lot of care, from a fertility perspective. And the reason for that is that it has the ability to fix its own nitrogen. So, it's its own fertilizer plant. So, it produces enough fertilizer to, or enough nitrogen to satisfy its, its, Most of it's nutrient demand.
So, the only time you may have to add a fertilizer is if you had, noticed a phosphorus or a potassium deficiency. And that would become, you would notice that by a sort of purple, purple foliage and, and a general, poor condition of the plant. But, I, you know, frankly, I have never seen that happen.
so fertilization isn't, isn't needed at all. Now pruning can be very effective in maintaining the high fruit yielding capacity of the plant. if you leave the plant to grow on its own, it's going to gradually develop this, this umbrella shaped canopy with all the fruit sort of on the periphery. And that's because it doesn't like shade.
So all the interior branches, if they're shaded out, will not produce fruit. So what I like to do is I like to have a pruning regime where you have what I call an open center system. So you would have your main stem, And then perhaps three or four scaffold stems coming off that main stem. And that's where the majority of your fruit will be produced.
So are you actually shaping it into a tree? Yes. Huh. Yes. So it's nice to, if you can control, the, any side shoots or ground shoots that are developing, keep them pruned away so that you end up with a single. a single stem. That's very interesting because with fruit trees, of course, often we do central leader pruning, which is very similar.
You've got your one central leader and you've got your scaffold branches and your, your idea is to get light to every single branch on the tree. So it kind of makes sense. Yes, exactly. We're basically following the open center pruning system that you would use on an apple tree. Hmm. So interesting.
[00:30:21] Listener Questions and Answers
Well, we have loads of emails and questions that I want to go through with you.
So let's dive in now. We've got Russ. who wrote from Arlington, Massachusetts, and he has a couple of questions. I'll do his second question first. He says, I have one single seabuckthorn plant, but I don't know if it's male or female. Is there any way to tell the sex of the plant without flowers or fruits?
The simple answer is, is no, you need to, to identify the flowers or the fruit. On the other hand, you, if you. are able to look at the buds, say in the winter time, the male buds will be quite large. These are the floral buds. The male floral buds will be quite large. The female floral buds are much smaller and finer in appearance.
Now, C. bactorum doesn't express its, its, its floral, It's flowers until about the age four, three or four after planting. So if you've just planted the, the shrub, you probably aren't going to know it's sex for several years. and if it was planted from a seed, there's a 50 50 chance it'll be, you know, male or female.
So I guess you recommend if somebody is going to be planting seabuckthorn to go and make sure that you choose one male plant and, you know, one female plant or two female plants. That's right, yes. You definitely need a male. It is diecious, so you will need a male plant, to, to, Okay, we have a question from Patrick in Seattle, so he writes very briefly, I found they don't fruit in the shade.
No, and that is very much, that is correct. I won't say they won't fruit in the shade because they will. They'll produce berries when they're in shade, but they just don't grow very well. And you're not going to get a very many flower buds developing. You'll get some, the tree will become very lanky and it'll be searching for light and if it's really a shade environment, it's just not going to do very well.
And you're really not going to be happy with it. Yeah, that makes sense. Now let's see what we've got here. Piso from Utica, New York. I hope I've pronounced that right, Utica. Piso writes, What do we know about its natural place in the forest or forest edge? And how can we mimic its natural or native polycultures?
Also, is this a true nodulating nitrogen fixer? Or is the jury still out on its nitrogen fixing capacities or capabilities? What do you say to PISO? Okay, that's a, there's a few questions there. In its, in its natural environment, C. bacterion will be growing on the periphery of a, of a forest, or in, for example, in, And along the Baltic Sea.
In, in Finland and Sweden, you'll find it growing on rocky outcroppings that are right on the edge of the sea in, in Siberia. It's, growing along the edges of, of streams and, and always in open areas. You'll never find that in a, in a forest environment. Now, it's very similar, and maybe, maybe some of your, your listeners are familiar with the silver buffaloberry.
It's a native shrub to western Canada and, and centrally, the Great Plains of the United States.
[00:34:10] Seabuckthorn and Nitrogen Fixing
And it's, it's a close relative to seabuckthorn. And it, and you'll find it's growing out in, in open spaces. And that's the same with seabuckthorn. So, so if you're trying to mimic its natural, environment.
You aren't going to plant it, I'm going to say in a, in a, orchard where you're mixing it with, taller growing plants. Now, the question about, nitrogen fixing. seabuckthorn is a nodulating species or genus, and it produces nitrogen through an association with Francia. So, it's, it's not a mycorrhizal association, but it is an association with Francia that through their nodules helps to, helps them to, takes atmospheric nitrogen.
Hmm.
[00:35:06] Listener Emails and Questions
Well, we've got a couple more. We have to very quickly go through, but I just, we just got a lovely email from Brida from Florida. And she says, hello, what a very interesting show. Thanks, thanks for all the great information. So I think she's enjoying listening to you. Very good. And we also got an email from Naomi in Calgary.
She's very excited. She says, my plants are three inches tall. Still, I am very excited. Please thank Bill for his efforts. They are changing my world. I am not at all a fan of thorns, but I would eventually like to have a you pick orchard that includes thornless seabuckthorn. Any fruit that is thornless is great for my grandkids, too.
So that was a nice email. Oh, one more question we've got from Chase.
[00:35:55] Seabuckthorn for Skin Ailments
I don't know where Chase is, but Chase says he heard, I've heard that seabuckthorn can be used for dermatitis. Is that true? Yes, it can be used for a number of skin ailments. And I know several, several companies in North America that are marketing the, both the fruit oil and the seed oil.
As topical for topical applications related to different skin, skin issues, including dermatitis. Interesting.
[00:36:30] Bill's Retirement and Legacy
Well, before we wrap up, I understand that your research on seabuckthorn is coming to an end. Yes, yes and no, I guess. I'm, I'm retiring in August of this year. But, my passion for, for plants, like seabuckthorn will continue.
And, I have my own little, grove of seabuckthorn where I'll continue my breeding work. I'll continue to, to, to work with, with people that are interested in this, this fascinating plant. answering questions, providing information, Just wherever I can help, I'll continue to do that. So what do you hope your legacy is going to be from these 25 years?
Well, I certainly would love to, to see Canadian growing seabuckthorn as being the major supplier of, of seabuckthorn products in North America. That would be nice indeed. Well, thank you so much for coming on the show today, Bill. I feel like we could talk for another 20 minutes if we had the time. Well, thank you very much.
I really appreciate the opportunity to, to, to share a little bit about this, this very interesting and unique plant of Seabuckthorn. Okay. Thanks. Goodbye for now. Bye for now. By the way, if you missed a part of this interview, or if you want to hear it again, just visit www. orchardpeople. com slash network, and you'll find an archive of previously recorded shows.
While you're on the site, be sure to sign up for my monthly newsletter, which is packed with fruit tree growing information in every issue. Now, coming up, what do you do when the future of North America's largest private collection of apple trees is in question? Well, you clone all the trees and plant them somewhere else.
After a word from our sponsors, we'll speak to Joanie Cooper of the Temperate Fruit Conservancy about her group's efforts to clone and replant thousands of amazing apple trees. So, stay tuned. You're listening to the Urban Forestry Radio Show. I'm Susan Poizner. This is Reality Radio 101.
[00:39:07] Philadelphia Orchard Project
Where am I? This place is amazing. There are birds, bees, and fruit trees, and I'm in the middle of a big city. You are in Philadelphia. Our city is growing more beautiful each year thanks to the Philadelphia Orchard Project. We plant fruit trees, berry bushes, and other edibles in city parks, gardens, and other public places.
I can see that. Raspberry canes, fig trees, and peaches. If I lived nearby, I would never go hungry. That's one of our goals. We want to help communities grow their own food by teaching residents how to plant fruit trees and care for them. We focus on the neighborhoods that need it most. It sounds like a great project.
How can I help? How can I learn more? Please visit our website at phillyorchards. org to volunteer or donate and you can also follow our Urban Orchard blog phillyorchards. org I will definitely check it out. Thanks so much and have a great day. This message was brought to you by the Philadelphia Orchard Project.
Hey Sally, your garden is looking great today. Thanks Gary. Your lawn is looking a little bit dry. Ah, that's okay. It's all going to change. Soon I'm going to plant a fruit tree in my yard. I'm thinking an apple tree or maybe peach. That sounds great, but do you know what you're doing? Well, fruit trees are easy.
You just plant them, water them. And wait for the harvest, right? Actually, that's not quite the case. What? Organic orchardists spend a lot of time protecting their fruit trees from pest and disease problems. Really? And in order to thrive, fruit trees need to be pruned every year. Hmm. I didn't know that.
I'll tell you what. Before you buy your tree, Why don't you go to OrchardPeople. com? You'll learn lots about growing fruit from the blog, and there's a fantastic monthly newsletter with seasonal tips and reminders. Maybe I should check that out. Yeah, then if you really want to move ahead, you can sign up for OrchardPeople.
com's beginner fruit tree care course. So maybe I should hold off on buying my tree today? You got it. The more you know, the better your tree will grow. Sign up for a free membership to OrchardPeople. com today.
Oh, what the hell she says, I just can't win for losing. Welcome back to the Urban Forestry Radio Show with your host, Susan Poizner, right here on Reality Radio 101. To contact Susan live right now, send her an email instudio101@gmail.com,
and now right back to your host of the Urban Forestry Radio Show, Susan Poiser.
[00:42:30] Temperate Orchard Conservancy
I'm Susan Poizner, and you're listening to the Urban Forestry Radio Show, a program where we learn about fruit trees, food forests, permaculture, and lots more. Thanks for tuning in. Now, some people are collectors. They collect stamps or coins. Some people collect art. But Nick Botner from Oregon had an interesting passion.
For 30 years, he collected apple tree varieties from all over the world, and he planted them on his farm. Now, Nick has over 4, 500 varieties of apple trees from all over the world. Some varieties are extremely rare, but Nick is almost 90 years old, and he's put his farm on sale. The buyer may not want to keep Nick's collection of apple trees, and so his legacy could soon disappear.
Now, that was a possibility that upset fruit tree hobbyist Joanie Cooper, who wanted to do what she could to save Nick's legacy. So Joanie joined up with some friends and decided to save the orchard by cloning each and every one of the 4, 500 trees.
[00:43:55] Joanie Cooper's Mission
Now, I think Joanie is here on the line. Yes, she is. She's here on the line with me now.
How are you today, Joanie? I'm fine. How are you, Susan? I am very well. And it's nice to have you on the show. Thank you. You're welcome. I wanted to ask you, when did you start your organization? The Temperate Orchard Conservancy got its 501c3 non profit designation in 2012. So, what was your goal? What happened at that time?
Well, prior to that, about two years prior to that, Nick Botner approached me and he was having some medical issues and so on, and he said, Joanie, you should buy my farm. He said, I'm getting older, and et cetera, et cetera. Nick, that, that's not going to happen. And so after many conversations and everything, we, I spoke with, lots of people about it and two other folks, Franki Baccellieri and Shaun Shepherd and myself decided we would start, an organization to do just that, to clone all of his varieties and Nick graciously Allowed us to do that.
And, this past spring, we have grasped most of the varieties. We have them here on the farm in, in, Molalla. Now, you say it's not, it wasn't an option to buy the farm. Why not? Well, actually, Nick has a big farm. He's got about 125 acres. And it's got timber and cattle and that sort of thing. His orchard is, is By acreage is pretty tiny.
It's only about six acres. So what you're buying, you're buying a huge farm for 1, 600, 000 for this little tiny orchard, which, which has one of each variety for the most part. And so it's not, it's not a practical option for commercial orchard. And, it's, it's kind of in the remote, out in the country.
It's down towards southern Oregon. And so, it, it's not a viable purchase just for the orchard. So, so where did Nick get all these varieties from? Oh, he has collected them from all over. Some of them out of the country. Most of them from here in the U. S. there's kind of a, an enclave of collectors. And that's what Nick is.
He's a collector. and they share, share back and forth. there are, several of us across the country who do fruit exploring and, hunt out old heirloom varieties, try to find them in homesteads and old farms. And that's sort of thing. Once one is found, then usually it's shared the other by with other people who have the same inclination.
So basically you'll take cuttings from that tree scion wood and you'll graft it onto root stock and then you propagate the tree in that way. Is that correct? Exactly. That's exactly what we do. I assume that most people realize you cannot replicate a variety by growing it from seed. That's right.
Especially with apples, for sure. Right. Now, so here's the question. You, you have, this amazing orchard. Are there any varieties that we may not have heard of that are so interesting and unusual and from weird countries? Can you think of any interesting varieties we might have not heard of? Well, we have a lot of them that people wouldn't have heard of.
You know, it's like Aunt Rachel's Red Apple or Barn Door Apple or something like that. And so they probably came from someone's backyard orchard or an abandoned orchard in some enclave around the country. But it's not something that necessarily would be an outstanding. apple or one that, you would, choose for your orchard.
One of the things that we will do once our collection is growing and fruiting, we'll be doing, tasting and, and testing. ultimately we want to have a laboratory here so we can do it. do DNA testing. so we can really narrow down the names of varieties because there are lots of varieties have half a dozen different names depending on where it came from.
Someone didn't know what it was, so they gave it a new name. It isn't necessarily a new variety, but it has a new name. And, so it's a challenge. Identifying apples is a challenge.
[00:48:42] Challenges and Future Plans
So, okay, you've grafted many of the trees, you have many more to go, where are you going to plant them? Okay, I bought a 40 acre farm in 2013, and all of the trees are here.
this fall, when the trees become dormant, then they're going into They're permanent orchard block right now, they're in nursery rows and growing and, we have almost all of the ones cloned and so we just have a few, if we have losses or something like that, we have just a few left to do. So that's a big investment for your hobby to buy a farm in order to plant the trees.
How did that work out? Well, I, we looked and looked, tried to find a place to plant this orchard. we got a couple of false starts, didn't work. And so, I sold my house in Portland and, then started to look for acreage and it gave me enough money for a modest down payment on this farm. So, it's a total commitment.
It's a total commitment, my goodness. Wow, and you're paying for the property rather than the organization, am I correct? That's correct. Eventually, eventually we hope maybe to do crowdfunding or something of the sort to, to pay off the farm, but right the moment, I'm paying for it. You must be very passionate about fruit trees, that's for sure.
I'm passionate about this collection. Wow. So, what does Nick think about all of this? Oh, he's very happy and very supportive. He's just a sweetheart and has been supportive of us all along. Amazing. So, what is left to do? What is the work that you're doing now this year? Okay, this year we need to put in a new agricultural well.
That will happen this fall. we just, took the, hay off of the, 17 acre field where the initial planting is going to go in. So we're going to work the ground, put on the cover crop, and, then we will lay out our rows in the fall, put in the irrigation, and, and then plant our trees this next fall and winter.
And your cover crop, what are you going to plant to improve the soil? I haven't decided. You know, it's really interesting. It's kind of fun, actually, because you try to get many opinions on what it, you know, what would be the best thing. And everybody has a little bit different opinion. So, I'm in the process of taking soil samples and I'll take them into the lab and kind of base my, my decision on what the lab tells me I'm lacking.
Hmm. So, you're, you're putting in an irrigation system. Is this, something that, again, you're paying for yourself, or have you guys done any fundraising so far to help support the project? No, we have done some fundraising and we have a grant, to help us with the soil preparation and to put in the irrigation and, and plant the trees this fall.
So we have gotten a grant from the Lillian Goldman Foundation, which is very generous. We couldn't possibly do this without it. Fantastic. What will happen, you know, you know, this is your property. So eventually, eventually it will be TLC's property. it's just a matter of, of time and the attorney is working out all the problems and, and the ifs and buts, but eventually TLC will own the property.
It is the home of TLC and, it will. perpetuate long after I'm dead and gone. Now, back to Nick's property, what was the state of the trees when you guys first started to explore that orchard? you know, fruit trees can have problems and pests and disease. Well, they do. He has a lot of problems with anthracnose.
And so, When we are taking science, we have to be aware of that because sometimes the, there aren't really good science to be taken off of a tree because of that. he doesn't have a lot of help, taking care of this orchard. So, it's a real challenge. It's not, it's not in mint condition. It's not perfect by any means.
It's, it really needs care. And this is one of the things that he was worrying about. . Mm-hmm . And, and how will you guys, take care of the trees? the, the seedlings that you then, not seedlings, but the grafted trees that you will then plant. Will you spray them? Will you do work organically? Will you consider, permaculture?
What are your, what are your goals with this new. Our goals are to do it, organically because, we will have people coming out to the orchard, I, I feel very strongly that we need an organic situation that's perfectly safe for, children walking through an orchard and picking an apple, there won't be any problems.
So this is our goal. So let's look ahead ten years. What's this all going to look like in ten years time? Oh, fantastic. It's going to be gorgeous. And so you've got 17 acres, 4, 500 to 5, 000 trees. and we'll be working with, local schools because we want to get programs going so the future farmers can work.
they can take a group of trees and do diagnosis and, and work with them. we're going to work with local food banks because obviously we're going to have a lot of apples and, but we're pruning. We will prune so that we have, science available, coming this next December. If people go to our website, which is home or which is temperate orchard conservancy.
If they want to put trees in their home orchard, they can order, science and they can do the grafting themselves. Oh, that's wonderful. So that, you'll share that, plant material or the, the cuttings with other people. Exactly. Yeah, and not just locally, I guess. If somebody is, wants a, you know, a cutting and they live a little further afield, will you send them?
Exactly, exactly. We've already, already started this, this past spring, on a very small basis, but yes, it will, there will be an order blank on there and all the description of, of what you can order and the cost and all that sort of thing. So, for a very modest fee, they'll be able to, get one of the scions from a tree that they've been looking for and grafted onto a rootstock for their own yard.
I'm really excited. One day when you guys are ready to see a rundown of the different varieties, 4, 500 different varieties that you're going to have overwhelming. It is overwhelming. It's because, you know, you look at any specialist fruit tree, catalog and they have lots of varieties, but certainly not 4, 500.
So I'm sure that there's some treasures in there that people would love. Love, love to know about well, and once, you know, once the trees are growing and producing fruit, then we can give an evaluation, describe it. We will have pictures available so that people will be able to see it. Know everything but taste.
Wonderful. Well, we are running, I can't believe the show has just sort of gone by very quickly today, but how can people learn more about you guys, support your work, maybe even donate a little bit to help fund some of your project? how can people help you? Oh, we would appreciate that. They can just go to our website, temperedorchardconservancy.
org, and they will find out all about us. And there's a place on there that you can, direct questions, and there's a, a place where you can donate, and we really welcome that. This is, a non profit. This is an all volunteer. Everything that we do is done by volunteers. Fantastic. Joanie, thank you so much for coming on the show this month.
Oh, you're welcome. Thank you for asking. I appreciate being able to share my story. It was a pleasure to have you. Hopefully we'll talk to you again. Goodbye for now. Thank you. Bye bye. Bye bye. What an interesting story.
[00:57:08] Conclusion and Next Steps
Well, that's it for the show today. It was so wonderful to speak to my special guests. We had Bill Schroeder from Agriculture and Agri Food Canada's SWIFT Current Research and Development Center.
And he, I spoke to him in Indian Head, Saskatchewan. And we just spoke to Joanie Cooper, President of the Temperate Orchard Conservancy. So check out their website to learn more about that project. If you missed part of the show or if you'd like to listen again, you can listen online. You can even download this podcast from iTunes.
How do you find it? Just go to orchardpeople. com slash network, and you can access this episode or previous episodes covering all aspects of fruit trees, food forests, and permaculture gardens. Now, while you're on the site, don't forget to sign up for my monthly newsletter at orchardpeople. com. I'll remind you about upcoming podcasts, and you'll get access to lots of free content, including articles, interviews, eBooks, resource lists, and more.
Tune into the show again next month, and we'll have lots more great guests. You're listening to the Urban Forestry Radio Show. I'm Susan Poizner from the fruit tree care training website, OrchardPeople. com, and I look forward to seeing you again next month.
Just visit www. orchardpeople. com slash network. And you can read our Frequently Asked Questions, and check out the free webinars and podcasts that we've recorded. Tune in next month and you'll meet some more great guests, and you'll learn more about fruit trees, permaculture, and forest gardens. Our show goes out on the last Tuesday of every month at 1 p.
m. Eastern Time. I'm Susan Poizner, thanks for tuning in, and I'll see you next time.
Thank you for listening to the Urban Forestry Radio Show with your host Susan Poizner, right here on Reality Radio 101.