This N That from the Olive Farm

[rox]

We ahve been real buys ont he olive farm, it just never seems to let up, we always have something to do and more that we should be doing. Had so much rain in May and June the weeds are out of control and my hsuband has to rototill allt he fields again. Which means picking up allt he drip irrigation lines, what a PIA.

The current activity is picking green almonds. People go crazy around here for green almonds. Instead of waiting until fall when they fall off the tree and you jsut pick them up off the ground we hand pick them at the end of June and beginning of July and sell them green. The amrket is tough this year, poor ecenomy means i guess people can cut back on a luxury fruite like green almonds. But then we got an order for 1,000 Kilos of Green Almonds an arab family was having a weeding and in particular the arabls love green almonds. Well there was no way we could pick 1,000 kilos + our normal picking but we managed in 2 days to pick 750 Kilos, my husband and myself. Plus I stopped and gave a guided tour to a Norwegian family so between the almonds and olive oil we made 900 Euros in 2 days. We were pretty happy with that.

But the darned almond trees, the branches are stiff, plus I went 3 years between prunning half of the trees so now they are humongous. I am using a pruning saw and cutting the branches in order to get to the almonds. Probably nt the best thing to be basically prunning the trees right now but at least we are getting the almonds and these are pretty big solid almond trees so they should survive. I took a picture of my hand to show that it is not all jsut sitting around watching your olives grow Between nicking myself witht he saw and the scratches from the brances we get cut up pretty good. Oh well it is only superficial and it heals.

Our lazy cat is on a hunting spree. 2 weeks ago he walked throught he house to the back patio where we were sitting with a rat in his mouth. Big long tail on the rat. Well the rat was faking it and the cat didn't stya on the rat and walked over to us leaving the rat laying there, first thing we know the rat jumps up and makes a bee line for the woodpile, which is right outside our patio door. I ahve got to believe that the rat didnt' stay int he wood pile long knowing there is a cat nearby so he shortly got out of town as soon as we left. I HOPE the rat is not still int he woodpile.

The next week I'm in the shower and my husband comes in and says. Now the cat caught a bird. He did that before but it was just a baby. Ww was I surprised to see that big bird the cat killed. He always brings us his conquests and we praise him, but i am still mad it him that he let the rat get away.

I paid a visit to our toursit office today as they are not sending us any toursits this year. Last year we had a lot of tourists so I need to keep that going. All in all we are working every day and we go to bed tired, but still happy.

 

[texasjohn]

great update.... thanks... you are a real working gal!

 

[Kyle_in_Tex]

Rox,
It would seem to me that hand picked green almonds would cost more than that. But, what do I know... Do they roast them?

Have you tried to get some of the newer type gloves that are synthetic? You can get some that have the finger tips already cut off for dexterity. I think they are sold to mechanics. Maybe you could save your hands from all the cuts and scratches.

If you find a cure for lazy cats(short of killing or ditching them), you could make a mint.

 

[jinman]

Like Kyle, I'm interested in knowing the reason green almonds are so popular. Is it their flavor or do they contain more nutrients?

I learn so much about olives and almonds just from your posts. You are my goto expert for sure Rox. Thanks for the updates. . . and I hope your hands heal up soon.

 

[rox]

Rox,
It would seem to me that hand picked green almonds would cost more than that. But, what do I know... Do they roast them?

Have you tried to get some of the newer type gloves that are synthetic? You can get some that have the finger tips already cut off for dexterity. I think they are sold to mechanics. Maybe you could save your hands from all the cuts and scratches.

If you find a cure for lazy cats(short of killing or ditching them), you could make a mint.

Kyle,
That is the wholesale price, we sell them wholesale for between 1.25 Euro a kilo and 2 Euro a Kilo. The work lately has not been that bad. We have had nice weather, not to hot. In previous years it was so hot, well since this is a family forum I better not say. In the 2 previous years we lost half our crop to a worm. This year my husband must have found the correct insecticide and timing because we have practically no worms. You can tel right away if there is a worm inside by the way it snaps off the branch. No they don't roast them, you jsut crack them open and eat the soft nut inside. It's delicious. It is mainly the arabls who go nuts (no pun intended) for them. But another wholsale customer of ours bought 25 cases and said he had an order in Isreal, so perhaps I should say it is a middle eastern delicacy. I don't know why Isreal would need to by Provence almonds though, I thought Jordan grew a lot of almonds. I always thought they did because of that candy covered almond called jordan almonds. That is what is given out at baptisms and at weddings over here, a little fancy gift wrapped package of Jordan almonds. I have some neighbors I have become acquated with, they are arabs I think Algeria or Morocco, and she showed me pictures of her daughters wedding, they had huge framed prints on their walls, and I thought it was interesting that during the reception the bride changed dresses 7 times. Learning about different cultures is interesting. That neighbor also loves green almonds and I read in the paper tonight about a huge Gourmet Fair in Aix with dozens of chefs cooking for I guess a couple thousand people if i read the article right, and tomorrow was a gourmet lunch and on the menu for tomorrow was a dish with green almonds. I jsut hope the market holds up because i hate it when we pick and then my hsuand comes back with 5/7/8 cases he didnt sell. He goes to the wlesale market on Monday/Wednesday/Friday. if we don't sell them on Monday we bring them back on Wednesday but then that is about it, they won't keep longer than that because they then have to be resold to the public. For monday we pick on Sunday and Monday morning. My husband says we need to pick 200 kilos tomorrow and we need to start early 5:30 am because he wants to watch his Suday car race int eh afternoon. My husband works hard on the farm, of couse I do also but not as hard as he does. He does all the tractor work, I do all the office work except he has to handle the accountant. We both bottle oil and make deliveries.

We'll never get rich on olive oil but it provides a modest lifestyle for us. We pay our bills and eat well, have complete health insurance including all pharmacy with no co-pay (well it does cost 2 euros now if we go to the doctor but pharmacy is no co pay). If you have good health and don't have to worry about what will happen to you if you get sick and you can pay all your bills that is pretty good in my book. No employess, no bosses, no custmers that we wait on all day long face to face, and no set hours. For the almond trees my husband sprays 3 times in the spring, throws a bit of fetilizer twice a year, and we irrigate as we irrigate our olive trees. The prunning we should do every 2 years and i let it slide to 3 (I am the one who pruns the almond trees) but other than that the trees just grow and give us their fruit. It is a different kind of farming than row crops, you are not so dependent on getting into the fields to plant and harvest etc. The trees are just there year after year and we jsut go pick up the fruit. It took a while to figure out that worm issue but that was our inexperience.

Our plan is one day to build a small mill to serve the locals, I have figured out in this industry that the mills make pretty good money. On our big years our mill charges are right at 10,000 Euros so there is money to be made owning a mill. Then we will build a small house on some vacant land we have here and give the farm to our son. He really wants the farm one day. He can have the farm and we can run the mill. A mill is a good business for a retired couple as yu really only work about 2 months a year. We can keep the mill which will provide us revenue and our son can have the farm, plus we will be on the same property and when we get old-old he will be right there to take care of us. I even ahve a name picked our for our mill. "Petit Mouline Roxanne" I think ti has a nice ring to it. I am already doing mill research and have had differnt mill equipment manufacturers stop over to our house and show us what they have. Last month my hsuband and I attended a real good mill meeting with a professor from Italy. This mill meeting was put on by our olive growers association, whihc is a great organization. They have a staff of 20 full time employees. In the meantime we are picking almonds in the same vein of "Make hay while the sun shines" Now is the time we harest so basically we jsut get down to business and get the job done. My husband is 57 and i'm 54 i figure we have about 10 more years until we transition to the next phase. We'll jsut keep everything healthy and growing and one day our son an be out there sweating picking up almonds . I'll be int he nice air conditioned mill.

 

[rox]

Like Kyle, I'm interested in knowing the reason green almonds are so popular. Is it their flavor or do they contain more nutrients?

I learn so much about olives and almonds just from your posts. You are my goto expert for sure Rox. Thanks for the updates. . . and I hope your hands heal up soon.

It is mainly their flavor, they can be quite addicting. We both always stop picking for profit and just pick and stand under the trees and eat them. You can't eat jsut one. they taste like an almond, the nut is firm not soft or mushy at all, they are white and have the same color as a fall almond but they ave a little bit of fresh green taste to them. If you look on the wikipedia page on the right it shows the nutritional value of RAW almonds Almond - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia We use a prunning shears to cut them open. real early in the season yu can crack them open with your teeth but the shells are to hard for that now. I think it is a shame that California is requirig almonds to be pasturized. I don't understand what bacteria they can get. They grow in a shell for goodness sake. If there is a little bird poop on the shell it is not like it is inside the almond. We spay for the wrom but that is duringg flowering not after, there is no nut at that time. It's really a nice natural fruit.

I still can't figure out why our almonds were shipped to Isreal, that is amazing to me, I hope they enjoy them and I hope that big arab family who has their wedding this weekend also are enjoying their 500 kilos of fresh green almonds. I know that if we didnt have almond trees and I saw fresh green almonds, still in thier green husks at an open air market i would buy them. Once you taste them you don't forget the taste and you go back for more. Plus it is kind of like soft shell crab season you only can get green almonds (remember the nut inside is white it is the husk that is green) for about 3 weeks and then they are done for the year. When the shell harden on the crabs that is it the season is done, same thing with green almonds.

 

[billbill1]

Rox, I've never had green almonds but smoked almonds are very tasty. Thank you for sharing with us again, it's all very interesting to me. I vote for gloves too, I can send you some if you would use them.

 

[tony123]

Rox, I've got nothing to add, as your posts are mostly about learning for me. But wanted you to know I'm reading and enjoying your thread.

Wait, I do have something to add. Get yourself some nice gloves, and you can avoid all those nicks. Or maybe you need more dexterity picking almonds?

More pictures would be wonderful. They could really help us understand your farm better.

Best wishes,
Tony

 

[Bird]

I don't recall ever hearing of eating green almonds before. Of course I don't know anything about almonds except a few things that have "shaved" almonds in them, and I eat quite a lot of "Mixed Nuts" that includes almonds. That's interesting.

 

[EddieWalker]

Rox, I've got nothing to add, as your posts are mostly about learning for me. But wanted you to know I'm reading and enjoying your thread.

Rox,

I agree with Tony. I'm a big fan and always find it fascinating to hear about your life. Even though you are in France, you are sill living the American Dream!!!!!

Eddie