Welcome to Avalon Orchards

Orchard News


	September 27,2012 Grounder Day is Saturday September 29th and the orchard will be open from 10 am to 4pm.All apples gathered from the ground are free. A voluntary gate donation of any amount to go to charity is all we ask!

	September 24th, 2012 The orchard is now closed for the season. It was a light and early crop this year and the orchard was completely picked out this weekend. We are grateful to our customers for their support and look forward to seeing you with an abundant harvest next year. We have fresh cider at the Brickworks in Toronto over the fall season. If you have a large order for cider please email us by the Thursday prior to the Saturday market so we can ensure that we fill your order. All the best to you and thanks again. We plan to have certified organic apple cider vinegar in the new year and will also have certified organic mulling spices for the holiday season to spice up your cider!

	This is the weekend of September 22/23 and it will sadly be our last weekend open. We have the remaining Nova Spys and Liberty and expect to be picked out for the season. We will miss everyone for Thanksgiving weekend this year and hope for a wonderful crop next year, Thanks to everyone for their support.Grounder Day will be Saturday September 29th.

	September 13th, 2012 We are busy making fresh cider this morning and it looks like a great weekend coming up. We will be picking the last of Freedom and Nova Mac this weekend. Liberty isn't ready yet - next weekend for sure. It's a treasure hunt but there are still lots of apples.

	Well it is a rainy Saturday september 8th and the apples are receiving a refreshing shower. We re picking the last of Freedom this weekend and still have Nova Macs. The Liberty apple is coming along and should be ripe for next weekend.

	AUGUST 31 2012 SUMMERS ALMOST OVER AND LABOUR DAY WEEKEND HAS ARRIVED. THE APPLES HAVE RIPENED EARLY THIS YEAR AND WE ARE STARTING TO PICK NOVA MAC THIS WEEKEND. THERE ARE STILL SOME FREEDOM LEFT AS WELL. HOPE WE SEE YOU HERE!

	august 25, 2012 Well it looks like a very warm weekend. Freedom has come along quickly and we have started picking them as well as Redfree. We have fresh cider and are at the Brickworks this morning.

	We will be opening on August 18th for the season and will be picking our early sweet Redfree apple. Hours are 10 to 5 pm daily every day until the end of the season. We hope to see you here!

	July 6, 2012 My time is passing by quickly! It's already July and the apples are growing larger. I see more and more even though our crop is light this year. Yesterday we racked our organic apple cider vinegar. Its the final stage before we bottle it for harvest season. It has taken 3 years to make and taught me a lot about patience and brotherly love. My brother came to my rescue to help me with this final stage. It made a big difference to rack it because the mother and sediment settle out and the vinegar becomes sparkling and clear.It tastes delicious and will be a premium product, naturally yours from Avalon Orchards!!!

	April,24,2012 Well spring is here with it's weather ups and downs - Today we had snow and freezing rain but our blossoms are still tucked in and haven't shown their face so I'm hoping they will be okay. We have been busy feeding our soil with organic compost. We borrowed a hundred year old manure spreader from our neighbour who grows great strawberries and raspberries close by. I will tell you more about them on a future post because they also have upick and grow with minimal inputs to their fruit.

	October 17,2011 We are now closed for the season and Grounder Day is Saturday October 22 from 10 to 4pm. Our charity this year is the Salvation Army. Pickins are slim so I suggest people come early in the day. We will be at the Brickworks for another few weeks and still have Macs and Liberty in storage by the bushel. We had a light crop of Spy this year so next year should be a bumper crop! A great big thank you to all our customers - new and old that came to support us this year.We look forward to seeing you next year and wish you all a happy and healthy year until we meet again. I will continue keeping you all up to date with orchard activity throughout the year. All the Best gaye

	October 8,2011 Well - what a day today! we are completely picked out of apples! We have Liberty and Mac picked in the store and will have lots of fresh cider ( which we are making at 7am Sun morning) pony and wagon rides and goodies in the store. We are sooo grateful to our customers for remembering us and showing up this year. It is truly a thanksgiving and we appreciate sharing it with our community of friends and customers.

	October 7,2011 What a beautiful day today and what a great weekend for Thanksgiving!We're picking the Nova Spy this weekend and expect we will be picked out.It's a treasure hunt to find Liberty and other varieties but I know were there is some George and Priscilla. The ponies are coming Saturday Sunday and Monday for the children and our wagon is fixed and on the road again from 12 until 4pm . We have lots of cider made fresh by orchard fairies last night.

	October 4,2011 We didn't have the best weather this past weekend but we had lots of pickers! We still have lots of Nova Spy but the other varieties are getting picked out. There still is Liberty but you have to go hunting deep in the rows to find them. Priscilla is cleared right out but there still is George and Trent.But it's only Tuesday!!!We have lots of school tours this week and are getting lots of calls about the long weekend. Again, we will have wagon rides and pony rides from 12 to 4 each day on the long week end and even if we are low on apples on the tree we have lots of Liberty and Mac in cold storage and will be making lots of fresh cider for the weekend.

	September 30,2011 Check out our orchard on youtube. Brock and Marta came to visit and filmed their experience here!Thanks to them for supporting our orchard.

	September 30,2011 This weekend we begin picking Nova Spy - it's always an indication that the orchard will be closing in a few weeks. There are lots of Liberty left and they are still crisp and Priscilla is also ready to pick for all the Priscilla enthusiasts. WE will also open the few rows of George we have. I think George is really Rubin but the fellow who grafted the trees was named George and we've always called them that.Its a delicious hard skinned red apple from Eastern Europe .

	September 27,2011 Now that we are well into the harvest,we can firm up our schedule! Grounder Day will be Saturday October 22nd from 10 to 5pm. Note that it is just the one day. The weekend of October 15th and 16th all apples are .50 per pound whether you find them in the trees or on the ground. Thanksgiving weekend we are open Saturday, Sunday and Monday and will have free wagon rides and ponies from 12 to 4 pm each day.

	September 22,2011 Sorry for the delay in updating our information.Our mother sadly died on September 11th in her 87th year. Many of you have met her here at the orchard and we will miss her very much. This weekend we are beginning picking Liberty and still have some delicious Macs and Freedoms left. We are getting ready for our Thanksgiving weekend and will again have free wagon rides and ponies for little people only! I'm hoping to have some other local organic food producers and purveyors here as well and maybe some health practitioners.Hope to see you here!!Our hours are from 10 to 5 daily.

	Week of September 5,2011 We were at the Trinity Bellwoods market in Toronto on Tuesday and just finished pressing cider to take to the Brickworks and a festival called the Taste of the Kingsway which will be on Saturday and Sunday in Toronto. We are really getting booked up with tours and it's great to hear from so many schools that have been here in the past. We are receiving requests for tours from other organizations such as community colleges. I hope more adolescents will be interested in coming here and learning about organic growing. We are pretty well finished picking Redfree and have started to pick Freedom and Nova Mac.We met many new customers this week and they heard about us on the internet. We were also really grateful to see so many of our previous customers again this year. I received a great family picture from one of our customers and I will put it up on our facebook page this week. Thank you to all for your support this week. Special thanks to Mama Earth Organics and Sharon McBride and McBride Organic Farm for carrying our apples !

	Week of August 29,2011 We had a great first week and picked enough Redfree to make our first batch of delicious cider.There's nothing like fresh cider - it's like drinking an apple. This week we start at the Brickworks and Trinity Bellwoods farmers Market in Toronto and will be there weekly with apples and cider for the harvest season. We were also at Savour Simcoe this weekend and Carla from Duntroon Farms prepared an amazing apple compote dessert with our Redfree apple and a reduction of cider and Dickey Bee Honey. It was great to see local chefs and growers/farmers working together to prepare culinary treats. This week we will continue to pick Redfree and watch Freedom and Nova Mac as they ripen.

	August 20, 2011 Well we opened today and are picking Redfree and Pristine. Many of our long standing customers have come to say hello after being closed last year. We have organic produce from Pine House Farms and our favorite Dickey Bee Honey products. We are just starting to pick our apples and will make our first apple cider on Thursday for next weekend.

	Week of August 1, 2011 The sun and rain have been welcome in the orchard and our apples are coming along well. We are planning to open the orchard Saturday August 20th for picking of our Pristine apple. Our trees are young but they have a heavy crop this year and this will be their first year of picking!I doubt they will last very long in the orchard and then we will have our delicious Redfree ready. Many of our customers ask about these varieties but come in September when they have already ripened and have been picked so we are letting you know now when they will be ready!

	Week of July 11th, 2011 This is the week of the mead full moon which was spectacular over the orchard sky. The trees appear to be reaching for the stars. The apples are in great shape and growing bigger every day. I'm always surprised when I see them because when they start out they are so small and by the time they reach mid-cycle they seem to overload the branch in abundance. We have started to book school tours for September and it looks like our first apple, the Pristine, will be ready within four weeks.

	Week of June 19, 2011 The fruit has set and it looks like we are going to have a good crop of Liberty, Redfree and Nova Mac. Our young Pristine trees also have lots of fruit this year. That means we will probably be open earlier this year as Pristine ripens at the beginning of August.