While apples are our primary focus here at Rural Ridge Orchard, we also enjoy growing for our own use other tree fruits that have merit and distinction and are difficult to find today. For the connoisseur, seeking them out is rewarding and worthwhile. Our enthusiasm has led us to collect pears that we think may grow well in the mid-Atlantic, peaches, plums, apricots, quince and the old Black Heart Cherry which is almost impossible to find these days. We propagate a selection of these fruits every year to sell to the discriminating enthusiast as well as our apples.
Many of these do not ship well, have a relatively short shelf life or other attributes that make them difficult to fit into the industrial agricultural system and mass distribution food market that dominates our food chain supply these days. The efficiency of this pattern is unparalleled and as a nation, we eat better and more cheaply than virtually anywhere in the world. Yet the price we pay is the decline of many of the special and varied flavors that come from plums such as the Green Gage and peaches like George IV, White Champion, Peregrine, and Elberta. We sell these fruits at the farm in season. They are often in very limited supply.
