Hort Batjer Address

What will the future hold? No one knows but Dr. Terence Robinson, pomologist with Cornell University was this years Annual Hort Batjer speaker and he discussed the vision of apple and pear orchards in the future.

ROBINSON: Now the challenge I've placed before our growers and the one I place before you today - I think orchards can be managed with almost half the labor than what we have traditionally used. So the challenge I put before you as the first Washington grower that can manage a tall spindle orchard with 145 hours total per year, I'm going to buy you a steak dinner. This orchard of the future would be managed with two machines.

Robinson says those two machines are one for harvest that also does dormant pruning and thinning. Then one for summer shearing.

ROBINSON: Let me conclude with my vision for orchards of the future. What will they look like? I think the economics is going stay kind of the same which is going to leave the optimum density somewhere around that thousand, 1100 - 1200 -1300 trees per acre. But one of the things we have to continue to push on is high yields in the first 5 years. So your new orchard should reach that target of 3300 bushels in the first 5 years. I think the new orchards are going to be tall but they're going to be thin and they have narrow canopies that will accomplish three things. They'll have very high yields/ They'll have excellent fruit quality because of good light exposure from the bottom to the top of the tree and they will be adaptable to these mechanical labor assist machines.

That's today's Fruit Grower Report. I'm Greg Martin on the Ag Information Network.