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Business Name |
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Your business tag line here. |
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Oregon Olive Trees™ |
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Oregon Olives |
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Oregon Olive Oil |
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Oregon Olive Trees |
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Living on the Edge - Growing Olive Trees in Oregon
First, the disclaimer! Olives are not a recommended commercial crop for Oregon:
Olives: Not Recommended in Oregon
The basic problem is that it gets pretty cold here in the winters. For example, here is a picture of a Leccino olive tree on Sept. 1st, 2008: |
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And here is the same tree on Dec 22nd, 2008: |
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It sort of got a little flattened… The cold, snowy, and icy spell in December, 2008 was reputably the worst here since the late 1960’s. Please do your own risk assessment; as we did. We decided we are willing to live with growing olives on the edge of where it may be possible to do so.
A little history…
Olives have been grown in Oregon since at least the 1890’s, and were commercially tried on the coast and in the Rogue Valley of southern Oregon about a hundred years ago. The only information I have been able to trace is that they were intended for olive oil, and they were abandoned due to “inconsistent yield”. In reality, about that time (~1910) cheap European exports put an end to most American attempts to commercially make olive oil. For the past 100 years, most olives grown in America, which almost all are grown in California, have been used for table olives, with olive oil being a “salvage operation” for the culls from the table olive processing. It is only recently that olive groves intended for oil production have been attempted again, mostly by well off people in coastal California who are doing this “for the prestige”. The oil is indeed prestigious, and expensive to make! Even more recently, there have been groves of upwards of a million olive trees planted in the Sacramento Valley of California. These groves are planted with special low vigor clones (especially Arbequina) and are intended to compete price-wise with the more moderately priced European extra virgin olive oils.
What we are doing...
Conventional wisdom has it that oil type cultivars should be grown in marginal climate regions. We are located just above the 45th parallel, which in Europe has long been considered the northern edge of the olive growing regions. Our groves are a combination of several experimental varietal trial groves, and a “production” grove, planted with the intent of making extra virgin olive oil.
The two varietal trial groves now consist of many different olive tree cultivars, with a special interest in "dual use" cultivars with large early ripening fruit. Dual use cultivars are those with enough olive oil to be used for that purpose, with fruit of a size and quality suitable for table olive production. There are different types of “marginal cold” areas, and we are trying out cultivars from all of them: low heat, high latitude, high altitude, and high temperature swing desert areas.
The extra virgin olive oil production grove (“Kathy’s Grove”) is four acres in size, planted with Tuscan cultivars in emulation of the modern olive oil pioneers in coastal northern California. And of course, we are both emulating what is done in Tuscany, which arguably produces the best olive oil in the world! The grove consists of Leccino (approximately 50% of the trees, as is typical in the Lucca area of Tuscany), Frantoio (~ 25% of the trees), Maurino (~10%), Moraiolo (< 10%), Pendolino (< 5%) and Coratina (<5%) cultivars.
Why do you want olive trees?
“I want to make my own extra virgin olive oil.” “I want to grow and make my own table olives.” “I just want to. They are such beautiful trees.” “I want to make money.”
In general, most fruiting olive trees can be used to make olive oil; and all fruiting olive trees can and are used to make table olives. And all olive trees are very ornamental! As for making money, ah, a very worthy goal, but it is notoriously difficult to make money with small scale farming. Your best bet is to follow the vertically integrated model of the boutique wineries in Oregon, and sell your product direct.
And what of the Leccino tree in snow, shown above?
After two weeks of snow and ice and temperatures down to 12 F (11 F at the nearest airport, in McMinnville), the Leccino tree pictured above did make it through the winter (Reken Estate, June 01, 2009): |
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Trees for Sale |
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Introduction |
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Planting |
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Growing |
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By August 10, 2009 the tree has come fully back, albeit shorter and bushier… Olive trees may be growing on the edge here, but they are still just very tough trees! |
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It lost almost all the branches smaller than about 1/2”, but new growth is sprouting all along the main scaffold (Reken Estate, June 01, 2009): |
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Lest anyone get the mistaken impression that Leccino is not one of the best varieties for Oregon: of all the trees that came through that storm, the single olive tree that has the heaviest crop today is a Leccino (olives fruit on last years wood; thus this particular tree - not the one shown above - must have come through the winter relatively unharmed).
Kathy’s Grove, Nov. 27, 2009 |
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Post Winter 2008-2009 Storm Photos
After your decision to plant olive trees, the next hard decision is what to plant. Since winter storms, and damage to the olive trees, is almost certainly going to be an occasional problem, here is a collection of photos of trees that came through the harshest winter storms since we have been growing olive trees. Note that winter damage varies amongst the cultivars, and also amongst individual trees of the cultivars. What this set of photos represents is some of the best individual trees. It is hard to say, given very limited experience, that any one cultivar is better than another, but as a group these cultivars are probably going to be amongst the best bets for Oregon. All photos were taken in early June 2009; when dead winter killed leaves have dropped and spring re-growth is just beginning. So most of the green olive leaves you see are from last year, and made it through this winter. |
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Frantoio |
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Pendolino (2) |
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Picual |
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Itrana |
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Coratina |
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Arbequina |