Orchard planting grants?

[bolthole]

Hi All,

 

Can anyone point me in the direction of any funding that might be available for the planting of new orchards.

 

I may be heading toward financial ruin but I'm looking into the commercial possibilites of Damsons!

 

My research tells me that I'd not get a decent crop out of the trees until they are 10 - 15 years old so I'd have to look at buying fairly mature stock...

 

...if anyone has any general advice about this sort of undertaking I'd be all ears!

 

Ta...

[Goaty]

I think they used to plant plums and damson type trees as a windbreak around commercial orchards, helps with attracting pollinating insects by shelter and more flowers.

Good on you I say hope it goes well, but do people eat damsons anymore? It was my favourite pie as a kid.

[felixthelogchopper]

You can buy Damson Jam in the supermarkets so somebody must be producing them commercially.

[arbmark]

as i am sure you know they are best cooked - so if you could find a way of adding value - pies, preserves,wine etc then you might make some money

 

the bigger the plant stock you buy, the more the cost of plants and the more staking required dont forget smaller stock catches up and are often healthier/sturdier in the long run.

 

cant see it being a massive earner tbh - something for the old age maybe?! get a few bee hives to help pollination and put some honey on the stall too..

[arbmark]

in north devon we had a grant scheme run through orchards live. ask local conservation organisations or try the county council or defra. might not be much in the current economic climate

[face cord]

I have a damson (technically a bullace I think but i call them damsons) tree in my garden, that is very productive its a massive old tree of the local native variety, probaly over 50yrs old.

 

Make alot of damson jam & damson jelly.

 

 

Also damsons (plus sugar) are nice, cooked from the deep freeze served with yoghurt or ice cream.

 

Noticed once that the local Waitrose were selling punes of damsons at £8 a kg.

 

You will have to compete against prince charles duchy brand:

 

Waitrose Duchy Organic preserve damson - Waitrose

[agg221]

If you want to grow them commercially, use a dwarf stock. The best bet is Pixy. You will keep the trees down to 8ft, they'll start cropping at about 3-4yrs and have decent crops at about 5-6yrs onwards. For maximum yield, you want to plant double staggered rows at about 8ft apart in the row, and keep permanently clear under them in the wide planting strips with weedkiller. They'll do best as centre-leader form and tie down the tops, so you'll need permanent stakes. This makes them crop earlier, and keeps them shorter (all picking can then be done from the ground).

 

This is nothing like the romantic notion of big standard trees growing in grass with sheep grazing underneath and a haze of blossom in spring, long fruit ladders in autumn. This works fine for personal enjoyment (and the trees will live a very long time like this - Mum's place was planted in 1919) but this form of orchard is no longer viable. I worked for someone who ran a small mixed fruit farm of a few hundred acres in Kent, everything at stepladder or ground picking height, mostly older trees grown in bush form. I was working for him at the time and we talked a bit about the economics of it. He had to work full time as a solicitor to make a living - the farm just covered its costs.

 

Alec

[bolthole]

Thanks for all the advice folks - I'm seriously thinking about Damson Gin. I made some last year and all my friends are raving about it.

 

Picked the fruit a bit early so it ended up being sublimely tart on the tongue (!!) with a wonderful taste a bit like sour cherries.

 

The best bit was that you could drink it on it's own and knock it back like wine such was the taste... it occurred to me as a commercial go-er as Gin has become really popular these last few years and, living in Cheshire, there are tons of apparently unloved Damson trees about.

 

I always try and support local food and am a bit fed up with drinking commercially produced English country wines which are sickly sweet and seem to miss the potential of our native fruit to taste good as an alcoholic drink.

 

This stuff I made was proper grown up stuff... was also mulling over the possibility of producing a Damson Spirit although the process would be a lot more involved and would require me to come up with a lot more capital to get going...