Cobble Knoll Orchard

05/29/2026

Keep an eye out for these late season apples with a Fruity Flavor!

05/15/2026

Going to be a little quiet around here in the evenings once it warms up.
Why did he spit out the most delicious-looking section?

05/14/2026

05/14/2026

What is this otter gnawing on? It is something VERY chewy. A frog? He's digging through the mud to get them. Sorry about the focus problems. I never dreamed he would pop up right next to me so I had the zoom lens on my camera.

05/12/2026

The Frostbites and their friend the Bumblebee.

05/12/2026

Tucker and Otis want to show you the orchard blooms tonight ♥️ Their favorite is actually the Frostbite (see the bumble reel) but they know everyone else loves the Honeycrisp. Sweet 16 and Macs are looking good! Beautiful colors out there. It's an exciting time of the year for the orchard!

05/12/2026

05/08/2026

Hearty Vermont fruit blossoms are strutting their stuff!
1. Zestar!
2. Pears
3.Peaches
4. Redfields

Zestars were affected by the cold weather the other week, but it looks like some tough bud clusters made it through. The peaches are holding their own and the pears have blossomed (even though a lot of their leaves froze off). The Redfields have beautiful dark leaves and brilliant flowers, they are destined for hard cider. We are grateful for the crop so far! 🤞 that they continue to thrive for the rest of the season.

04/28/2026

Keeping the deer out of the orchard is a full time job! This tree - which is still alive - broke off at the roots for some reason. We tried to right the trunk so we could still use it as a fence post, but it was a little off-kilter.
Don't worry,...... 11 strands of electric wire and the deer STILL snack all winter.

04/21/2026

It went down to 21 degrees early this morning in the lower orchard and 24 degrees at the top. Our apple trees were at tight cluster, which is just before the blossoms start to show some pink color (see the last photo). 21 degrees will kill off 90% of the fruit buds at this stage. 😳That will be devastating for our apple crop this year.
Friends to the rescue!
Even though our son Travis is a helicopter pilot, he is off in Juneau Alaska flying over glaciers. We are so lucky to have kind and generous friends in the helicopter world! The helicopter was able to warm up the orchard by 4 degrees - hopefully enough to make a big difference.
Things we learned:
Find the warmer air mass above and push it down (it was 30 up there!)
Sweep the warm air down over the colder parts of the orchard
Go low and slow to push that warm air down (you could really feel this! A warm summer breeze -well, almost...)
We will check the viability of the buds tomorrow and fingers crossed that it helped.
All across the East, orchards are experiencing disastrous crop loss due to the warm weather we had last week and the frigid nights that followed. We hope everyone has better crop yields than they anticipate. ♥️