Last weekend, Tom and a fantastic crew of three added 170 apple trees to our orchard. We had planted 120 cider apple trees in December. With the new trees, we now have 15 varieties. The additional varieties include Ambrosia, CrimsonCrisp, Honeycrisp, Gala and Aztec Fuji. Yes, I envision a lot of experimenting with apple pies and apple dumplings in the future!

Based on their maturation cycles, we should be harvesting apples from August through mid-November, with Smith Cider, Sansa and Honeycrisp arriving first in August, Albemarle Pippin and Winecrisp in October, and Arkansas Black bringing up the rear in November.