Up or Down, It’s Up to You
April, 2024
One of the first things my husband and I agreed upon when we moved to the farm was that it needed an orchard. I imagined visitors being able to pick fruit from the trees and having pollinators happily buzzing around and spreading pollen and seeds. Soon after we settled, we went to a local nursery known for having organic treelings, and a few weeks later our forty little fruit trees were delivered and planted, along with a few mature apple and peach trees purchased from our orchard neighbor. Back then, I knew next to nothing about how to care for the trees. I thought it was as easy as watering them and watching them grow. Like most of my undertakings at the farm, I quickly realized there was a learning curve, and I was on the low end of it.
Luckily, we have a wonderful arborist (Bo) who shows me the ropes and lets me in on the secrets to growing healthy and happy fruit trees without chemical pesticides. I didn’t realize at the time, but those trees were going to teach me plenty of lessons over the coming years. Parallels between nature and life abound - you just have to look.
The first year, the trees hardly budded and I knew there wasn’t going to be fruit. The trees were tiny. Many were staked and their branches were frail, so I was looking forward to the following year when they would produce. The next spring, I watched with anticipation as the tender little buds formed. In a few months we would have fruit! So, when Bo came to walk through the orchard and told me I should probably pluck the fruit just as it was beginning to grow, I was not thrilled. It turns out that in order to set up healthy fruit trees for the future, it is advisable to remove the early fruit during the first few years the trees start producing so the tree’s energy is directed towards growing strong branches and roots, allowing for a more bountiful fruit harvest in the future. Some people let the fruit grow and harvest what they can and others pick and wait.
I had a choice. I could have the immediate reward of some early, yummy fruit or wait a few more years for a better yield. I decided I had gone my whole life without having an orchard - what was another few years? The intellectual concept of patience and the actual practice of being patient are two very different things. My Yoga teacher, Sonia Sumar, of Yoga for the Special Child ®, has taught me through countless hours that patience is one of the “golden keys” to working with children with disabilities. In my own life, I have to practice patience daily or I would be quickly overwhelmed by the breadth of my childrens’ unpredictable physical and mental health. I am taught patience by training our mini donkeys, who famously “need a donkey minute” to process and assess what is being asked of them (and they never forget a transgression, no matter how unintentional or minor!) I have to be patient each time the pigs dig under their fence and I have to come up with new ideas on how to thwart those adorable, rooting snouts. So, now I had new teachers to remind me of the importance of patience. My young fruit trees had to be stripped of their fruit so they could have every chance to grow strong and hardy. Always a student, I accepted my role and waited. Time passed, as it always does.
The next year I decided to pick some fruit from just a few trees that had grown taller and sturdy throughout the year. The peach and plum flowers budded early during an exceptionally warm March. My weather app showed the lowest temperatures moving forward would stay above 33℉. I love my weather app for tracking radar, but when I went out to feed the animals and check on my transferred seedlings and trees, it was clear that there had been a freeze. Delicate pink flowers dropped from the trees, and I had to practice patience another year. At least there were some apples and pears to enjoy. But, mostly I took the freeze as a sign to keep plucking whatever new fruit grew early, and just let the trees grow.
The following Spring was glorious - no late freezes! We had peaches in the summer! There were plenty of sticky, happy faces. I had my first (unsuccessful) attempt at no-sugar-added peach preserves. I got a dehydrator and was planning on making apple chips next. My husband got the cider press out of the shed. However, when our apples started to grow, they immediately shriveled. Many had little holes in them. I had to pivot away from the anticipation of apple chips and cider and just play the cards I was dealt. There was nothing else I could do but consult the arborist and patiently wait for another trip around the sun.
There are a bunch of steps that you have to work through in order to be an organic farm, so I will not claim to be organic. That being said, we do not use pesticides and we make our own fertilizer. We sometimes get little worms and weevils on our apples, but the fruit is still delicious. The problem is that because I am a newbie, I didn’t know that if you are using organic methods you can’t always anticipate what is coming with each growing season. In this case, it was fungus. Pesky, ruinous fungus. I am in awe of the underground neural network created by fungi, which connects our trees and balances our ecosystem (read the January 2023 blog if you don’t believe me). But the fungus that destroyed our orchard? Not so much. It quickly consumed the orchard and quelled any hope for a fall harvest. Taking the advice of Bo, we decided that the next year we would use an organic certified anti-fungal to stop the mass fruit casualties. They sprayed a few weeks ago. We shall see. Life is nothing if not unpredictable.
At the same visit where we discussed our fungal strategy, I asked Bo to walk the orchard with me to see how I did pruning and shaping the trees. This has to be done at the very end of winter before warm weather days surprise and delight us. Mostly, I did well. I learned the previous year how to cut away branches that looked as if they were going to cross others, scaffold in a way that would allow sunlight and airflow, and make sure there was a clear central lead branch on each tree. Bo helped me make decisions about branches I wasn’t sure about and pointed out some suckers I had missed. Suckers are small stems that sprout near the base of the trees and divert water and nutrients from the main tree. Much like the suckers on a tomato plant, these guys have to go so the main tree can thrive. We all have those people in our lives who are draining to be around - I now choose to think of them as suckers and try not to associate with them.
I saved my puzzling tree for last. This one, affectionately named Eileen, well… leans. A lot. She is too strong in her roots to stake. She is actually quite sturdy and stalwart. She just leans. “So,” I asked, “What do I do with this one?” After pushing hard on the trunk with his foot and establishing that the tree was indeed firmly rooted, Bo turned to me, pointed at the side leaning closet to the ground, and said, “Cut all of those branches off at the trunk.” Huh?! ALL of them? They weren’t suckers. They were established branches with good intent! He explained that by cutting what was effectively half of the tree off, the other half would grow bigger, shifting the weight of the tree, and eventually the tree would right itself.
It made sense. And, it also reminded me of how sometimes in our lives, we need to cut off people who don’t help us grow in the right direction. It isn’t easy; however, learning to surround yourself with people who can strengthen your roots rather than weigh you down/or try to bend you to fit in their schema of what life should look like is an integral part of parenting kids with disabilities. Find your tribe; grow your roots.
It is my deepest honor to learn from the trees and be able to provide a place for the community to enjoy in which patience, kindness, and acceptance is valued above all else. Helping Friendly Farm will never be a sucker or weigh you down. In fact, the people at the farm will help you stay strong in your roots when a crazy wind blows.