Beginnings

We planted the bulk of our trees on a drizzly Saturday, 1st March, 2003. It was a party. Six friends had arrived from Auckland especially to help and we dragged along our sister-in-law who lives nearby. A neighbour, one of the region's old-time farmers, stopped by to tell us we were lucky with the weather - the light, persistent rain had that day broken months of draught. We were a sodden and muddy bunch when we popped the champagne later that afternoon, euphoric from having tucked 580 trees into the ground in a single day.

Hot, parched and ripped, ready for posts and planting.

Planting, the day the drought broke in March 2003.

The speed at which this happened, however, belied months of preparation. Seven mature shade trees had been removed from the paddock where animals once grazed. Twenty-five rows were carefully measured, oriented north, marked and ripped. Holes were laboriously bored into the rock-hard ground. An automated seven-station irrigation system was installed and left to run continuously for two weeks prior to planting in an attempt to make the hot, parched soil more hospitable for young trees. Through all of this we relied heavily on the advice and help from friends, family members and rural support businesses.

Not long after our trees were planted our neighbours felled a boulevard of very old pine trees that provided shelter from the west. We hurriedly put in a row of crowsnest poplars as a replacement shelterbelt but, even so, our young olive trees took a severe hammering from the wind. We struggled to find a tie system that held them securely onto the wires without ring-barking or quickly perishing in the sun. Our main ongoing maintenance activities continue to be replacing tree ties, weed control, and mowing between the rows with Ferg, our stoic, 1950 Ferguson 24 tractor.

Bob and Ferg gather up the prunings.

Aquiferra is a very small olive grove, even by New Zealand standards. To date, picking has been done by hand but the trees are spaced and pruned to allow for the option of machine harvesting in the future. By year 6 we estimate our production from current plantings will be around 6.5 tonnes of fruit per annum, yielding a possible 600 litres of oil.

Our oil is marketed fresh, in dark bottles to prolong its shelf-life. It has the distinctive flavours for which fresh, New Zealand olive oils are becoming renowned.

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