What did you do in the garden today?

[Smokerbill]

I was on Pinterest and seen a sign of a chicken running and the sign read: Live today like you're getting fired tomorrow. I had to share it

Getting fired? Or getting fried?

 

[Minanora]

Now I have olive picking questions.

Are the trees tall enough that you need ladders? Having never seen an olive tree, I don't have any idea about their growth habit.

Do olives tend to ripen all at once, so that you're just picking everything, or do you have to pick according to the ripeness of the fruit? Is there one main harvest, or several smaller ones?

Olives and ginger are two crops I wish I could grow here in Michigan.

Some of the trees are quite tall, we do get up on ladders of various sizes. The original owner of the home planted olive trees as landscaping but must have picked them, based on the varieties he chose. His gardens were used as test and show gardens for Sunset magazine.

My MIL planted 100 that will be kept short in her orchard. I personally think she's crazy, we get a lot of oil already. But she wants more I guess.

Olives do not ripen all at once. Nor do you want them to. Green olives give less oil but higher polyphenol levels. Also a much stronger, grassy, peppery, flavor due to the high level of oleuropein. While ripe olives have about 15-30% more oil but it's much more mild and lacking in oleuropein as it breaks down as the olives ripen. It's good to have a blend of ripe and green olives. Green olives also tend to have less damage and quality issues. Ripe olives are softer so fruit fly damage increases. The olives get pressed the same day they are picked. To maintain quality. We generally get ours pressed within 3 hours of us finishing picking. We do not let the mill use talc for our oil. Just as a personal preference.

We have done two harvests before when we have a lot of olives. If we had our own mill and press we would harvest every weekend over about 6 weeks as a reason to hang out and spend time with family.

We have talked about brining olives but have never done it. We may this year.

When you pick for 12 hours, close your eyes and see olives, and dream about olives. The last thing you want is to pick more and process them.

You can grow ginger in Michigan. It's just an annual, not a perennial.

 

[CatInTheHenHouse]

Olives and ginger are two crops I wish I could grow here in Michigan.

You can grow ginger indoors in pots! You can start it with a rhizome from the grocery store.

 

[Sally PB]

We do not let the mill use talc for our oil.

What does this mean?

Thanks for the explanation in your last post. It's really interesting!

 

[Minanora]

What does this mean?

Thanks for the explanation in your last post. It's really interesting.

Well the mill tells you to do it, and they will do it if you don't tell them not to.


It can increase yield but it's not a benefit for us. It makes the oil cloudy and then you have to filter if. It changes the taste. It's just not what we're after.

Here's a Google snip.

We would rather have less oil.

 

[Sally PB]

Well, that was interesting!

I think as you do. I'd rather have less oil than add something to it.

 

[Molpet]

Well, that was interesting!

I think as you do. I'd rather have less oil than add something to it.

Yes especially with the asbestos in baby power issues. Talc got it in the mining process.
Johnson & Johnson: J&J's Talcum Powder & Asbestos | Talc Lawsuits https://share.google/7WdYVfe3AXoEAsV5c

 

[Minanora]

Looks like a lot of work.
Is any for sale?

None for sale at this time.

 

[Minanora]

That is cool! Are any of the olives you pick brined and processed into eating olives?

We may pick more and brine but I don't really want to.

 

[Minanora]

Yesterday I shook and pulled all of the leaves off of the peach trees so I could spray them with copper and neem. The three that had it bad this year got a really thorough treatment.

My 2 gallon sprayer took a crap on me and was pumping the mix out through the pump assembly. So I had to pour my spray into a small handheld sprayer from home desperate that I previously used for watering seedlings. It took much longer but it had to get done.

I wasn't able to spray last year and I had really bad leaf curl this year. It's my understanding that the fungus will over-winter in the node where the leaf fell from the tree. The tree heals over the fungus and then you can't get rid of it by spraying. By forcing (the leaves were ready to fall, so a good shake takes them off a bit early) the leaf drop, you can spray while the nodes are open and kill the fungus before the tree heals over it.

I will spray again just before bud break. Assuming I get enough time between rains.

Today I need to work on cat proofing my beds until the plants are bigger. The tomato cages are working but the cat wanted to crap in my garden so badly that it did so between my garlic plants.

I discovered that I caught another opossum in my trap. He's very large. So I need to set up my tote to dispatch him. The ground is soft enough that I can bury him in the orchard to feed the trees.

Still haven't had a real frost yet. Which is crazy since we usually get a frost before the end of October