junior year in college my advisor pointed out that as a history major i need only take one biology course in order to graduate. "taking ornithology courses semester after semester just does not make sense" i did not agree. as a east coast transplant i was mesmerized by oregon's flora and fauna and...woman.
the bird watching classes at UofO involved lots of field work in the beautiful williamette valley, cascades, and oregon coast. cool birds including the tufted titmouse. added bonus was that lots of hot woman enrolled in these classes. fun and distracting. and my grades reflected such.
a decade later in seattle looking for a distraction from running my biz i decided to take a seminar on pruning fruit trees. well duh horticulture and ornithology classes have something in common. hot woman. what i did eventually take back to my orchard was one basic rule of thumb. prune to let the sun in. espalier tends to focus on the aesthetic but it's also very practical. i mean look at pretty much any vineyard or commercial orchard in the world and they are training fruit trees into patterns (i consider this a form of espalier). and as i experienced with training this bosc pear (pic above), the simple espalier-like training opens the tree up to all the sun and...boom they make fruit aplenty.
a decade later in seattle looking for a distraction from running my biz i decided to take a seminar on pruning fruit trees. well duh horticulture and ornithology classes have something in common. hot woman. what i did eventually take back to my orchard was one basic rule of thumb. prune to let the sun in. espalier tends to focus on the aesthetic but it's also very practical. i mean look at pretty much any vineyard or commercial orchard in the world and they are training fruit trees into patterns (i consider this a form of espalier). and as i experienced with training this bosc pear (pic above), the simple espalier-like training opens the tree up to all the sun and...boom they make fruit aplenty.
ok so first note that this li'l guy is laden with peach, a northwest fav called the frost peach cuz it tolerates cool summer nights. second of note, check out how in the first picture it looks dry as hell beyond the fence line. it is parched because there's basically no rain in the San Juans for the 3 months starting in July. but in the second pic there's some green grass going on. no biggy but i don't water the orchard. it's got it's own thing going on.
years back some local folks were discussing the source of our island's groundwater. after all we are a rock sticking up out of the salish sea. their tale was that our groundwater pressure derived from the cascade mountains, some 30 miles to the east. hmmm. a few months later during a airport lay over i chatted w/ a hydrologist about this water from far away theory. he chuckled and said "you've got steep high ground near your place, right?" yes, i acknowledged. that'd be cady mountain in the pic above. he explained that even on a rocky island there's bound to be groundwater. fresh water. and where there's significant changes in elevation the higher ground's ground water can pressurize the groundwater below, sometimes even seeping to (or near) the surface. my orchard benefits from such a foot print. a delicate balance between not soggy yet moist enough near the surface so that roots can self serve. a lucky spot on our otherwise bone dry farm (in august).
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