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Orchard Outlook: Strawberries

Posted by :Julia Prince On : April 30, 2018
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5/8/18 Update: Strawberries are now in season! We anticipate that strawberries will be available until early June.

April Showers…

It’s a very exciting month here at Chiles Peach Orchard: April. Our plants are beginning to blossom and so is the promise of juicy fruit and summer days. Peaches have just finished blooming, cherry trees are at peak prettiness, and our apples are just beginning. We anticipate starting strawberry season the second week of May, depending on the weather between now and then. Be sure to follow us on Twitter @ChilesPeachOrch for the latest picking updates (#whatspickingCPO).

cherry blossoms at Chiles Peach Orchard

Life of a Strawberry Plant

Our patch is currently covered to protect it from chilly nights, but the plants are strong and healthy under the tarp! This big blanket keeps the heat in and prevents frost from settling on the plants. You can tell things are going well because the leaves are vibrantly green and have a lot of growth. In some spots, the petals have already fallen and little strawberries are starting to form. Once the fruit blooms, it takes about 30 days to ripen into the perfect strawberry, so we are getting close!
Strawberry plant flowering

Ready to Pick?

Once the patch is ready for pickers, you’ll want to look for berries that are red all the way to the tip. Did you know that strawberries don’t ripen after they are picked? That’s right—a green strawberry will stay green when you take it home, so hold out for those gorgeous red strawberries. For tips on how to pluck strawberries from the plants without damaging them, see our how-to guide.

Pick-Your-Own Pumpkins Now in Season

Posted by :Julia Prince On : September 25, 2017
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You read that right! Pumpkins are now pickable at Chiles Peach Orchard. We’ve got all types of pumpkins and fall gourds just waiting for you in our pumpkin patch.

Find that perfect jack-o-lantern pumpkin you’ve been searching for, or round up ingredients for a new recipe or craft.

Don’t worry—we still have plenty of apples in our orchard! Check our fruit availability chart to see what’s on hand.

Pumpkin patch at Chiles Peach Orchard

Pick-Your-Own Apples Now in Season

Posted by :Julia Prince On : September 5, 2017
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It’s hard to believe that summer is already over. It’s not all sad, though. In fact, fall is one of our favorite seasons here at Chiles Peach Orchard, because it means pick-your-own apples are here! We also have two of our favorite events: the 4th Annual Pancake 5k and 6th Annual Fall Into Fun Festival.

Fall weather makes for a perfect trip out to the orchard. Bring your family, friends, or even a date for a unique and memorable outing. Want to stretch your day trip into a weekend? We believe in making fun last, so check out our recommendations for what to do in Crozet.

Of course, we understand if you’re just raring for some apples. We get that feeling too! Be sure and check our fruit availability guide if you’re on the hunt for a specific fruit variety…but don’t worry, our cider donuts and tasting rooms are always in season.

Pick-Your-Own Apples Are Here

Posted by :Julia Prince On : September 5, 2017
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We’ve had a peachy summer at Carter Mountain, but it’s time to turn our attention to fall’s bounty: apples are ready to for picking!

If you’ve got your eye on a specific recipe, follow us on Facebook and Twitter for updates on apple variety availability. If you’re just looking for fresh air, gorgeous views, and maybe a little booze, every day’s a good day to c’mon out to the orchard! Or, mark your calendar for Johnny Appleseed’s 243rd birthday and pick apples like it’s the 18th century.

Make a day of it and have lunch at our Mountain Grill, which is open daily for farm-to-table dining. Don’t go home without our famous apple cider donuts (it’s OK, you’re having fruit too!).

Ready-picked peaches will continue to be available for purchase, along with certain apple varieties, for a bit longer.

See you on the mountain!

How to Grow a Family of Healthy Eaters

Posted by :Julia Prince On : August 17, 2017
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No matter how well-rounded your taste buds are, chances are your little ones (or maybe even the bigger ones in your family…*cough*) are picky eaters. You probably don’t need to be told twice that a balanced diet with lots of veggies is crucial to your well-being. So how do you get the kids on board?

Leave ‘Em Out

If healthy foods are the only thing available when your kids are hungry, they’ll get used to eating them for fun. Try leaving out a plate of vegetables for when your kids get home from school so it’s the first thing they see when they look for an afternoon snack. If you’re on the go, stock a cooler with carrots, celery, or other easy-to-munch veggies.
Selection of Chiles Peach Orchard veggies

Embrace Dipping

While many store-bought dressings are full of sugar and other not-so-good ingredients for your family, it’s fairly simple to put together a homemade dressing with Greek yogurt, spices, and oils. Butter is also an easy additive when cooking up veggies—it reduces the bitterness that your kids are scared of.
selection of dips

Lead by Example

Make sure you and your spouse are open about the benefits of healthy foods. Talk about how it’s fun to try new things, and how some foods just take a little while to get used to. If your kids admire any sports stars or musical artists, it doesn’t hurt to mention that vegetables are what give them the energy to perform at their best.
basket of Green Beans

Pick Your Own

Give your kids ownership of their diets. Bring them down to the Orchard and let them pick their own green beans, tomatoes, and more. If they’re old enough, have them cut or season them at home. Be sure to affirm them with your excitement to eat what they’ve selected and prepared. It’s beautiful for kids to take pride in their own healthy eating habits, and you’ll grow great memories too.
display of fresh vegetables at Chiles Peach Orchard

Stay Balanced

An apple cider donut or two never hurt anyone! Offering dessert can incentivize your kids to finish their greens, but expressly forbidding sweets can just make them more tempting (and your kids will scarf down said treats even faster when they’re offered elsewhere). Don’t be afraid to let your little ones experience the full spectrum of delicious food.
mother feeding ice cream to daughter

Goodbye, Strawberries—It’s Peach Season

Posted by :Julia Prince On : June 30, 2017
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Goodbye, Strawberries

One of the longest strawberry seasons in recent history has drawn to a close. The berry fields have been picked bare, their fruit gone into jams, pies, and children’s snack packs. There’s nothing like a red, ripe strawberry and we can’t wait to welcome berry-lovers back to the orchard for new year’s crop of pick-your-own strawberries next May.

What was your favorite strawberry season memory? Share your story with us and our community of “outsiders”!

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Hello, Peaches

Strawberries have had their day in the sun, which can only mean one thing—it’s peach season! The peach trees are loaded with pounds upon pounds of fresh, juicy peaches (Seriously, how do the tree limbs support so much delicious fruit?).

Pick-your-own peach season typically runs mid-June through mid-September. See our fruit availability calendar for a full schedule of pick-your-own availability, and follow us on Twitter for daily weather and picking updates, #whatspickingCPO.

Donut and white peaches won’t be the only stone fruit filling the farm market this summer: ready-picked nectarines will also be available.

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Can’t Wait to See You, Vegetables and Flowers

An exciting new venture, pick-your-own vegetables, and flowers will start sometime in July. Eat farm fresh with pick-your-own and ready-picked squash, zucchini, cucumbers, green beans, and tomatoes throughout the summer.

We dare you not to smile when presented with a colorful bouquet of our flowers. Flower varieties will vary over the next several months, with sunflowers and zinnias available throughout.

Summer is nearly upon us, and with it comes a bountiful harvest of fruit, flowers, and fun. See you at the orchard, outsiders!

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We’re cherried out!

Posted by :Franziska Matiuk On : June 19, 2017
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2017 Cherry Season Has Come to a Close

This past Sunday—June 18, 2017—marked the last day of a successful cherry season. This year we opened on May 26, giving us almost 3 sweet weeks of picking. Every year, picking season is a little different—last year, we opened for just one weekend. You can imagine our excitement for a plentiful harvest this time around!

Cheryl G. shared this review on Google:

“Lovely place to spend an afternoon, it’s off the beaten track but the scenery is breathtaking and the fruit is delicious! Sure, it might be a little more expensive than buying cherries at the grocery store but the taste is unparalleled and the location is so serene. There are some smaller trees so the little ones can also pick their own and portapotties on site. There are some lovely places to stop off nearby in Nelson County and make a day trip of it. Highly recommend making the trip out here. Also recommend buying more cherries than you think you need as you’ll find yourself eating handfuls all the time, they’re that good!”

So, thanks to everyone who came out! Keep scrolling for a few of the MANY wonderful photos that you posted to Instagram!

If you weren’t able to make it to Spring Valley, be sure and visit our sister orchards Chiles Peach Orchard and Carter Mountain Orchard for fresh fruit and fun.

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Mid-June Crop Update for Chiles Peach Orchard

Posted by :Cynthia Chiles On : June 16, 2016
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Pick-Your-Own Peaches Will Be In Short Supply…

As you are likely aware, we’ve had some major challenges with the weather this year. Our winter was extremely warm (warmest on record, as a matter of fact), so our peach trees didn’t get all the dormant time they require. They also bloomed in mid-March, 3-4 weeks earlier than normal. This means they were quite advanced when the mid-April freezes and frosts hit us. We had several nights below freezing, and even some nights in the low-mid 20s’. Our peach crop in Crozet, which is a rather low elevation, suffered significantly. For the past few weeks we’ve been watching with hope as the fruits start to form, only to then drop off the trees.

Because of this, we will have a very short supply of pick-your-own peaches at Chiles Peach Orchard this year, and they will likely be available sometime in July (stay tuned, we will keep you posted). We will, however, have plenty of our own already picked peaches for you (see below), no never fear – you can get your peach fix! We appreciate your understanding, and we will always provide you with the very best that we have.

Peach blossoms after cold snap

Henry Chiles checking peach trees in the spring for live blooms after a cold snap

But, Already-Picked Peaches are Available

Fortunately, we grow peaches on other land in Albemarle County, and some, at higher elevations, were less affected by the freeze. We’re pleased to let you know that we are supplying our farm market with our own peaches this summer, as always. Clingstone peaches are in season now, and we expect our first freestones in mid-July. Nectarines, white peaches, and donut peaches should be available by late June.

Ready-picked peaches in Crozet

NEW! Pick-Your-Own Blueberries

We first planted our blueberry bushes 3 years ago, and we’re happy to report that this year, we do have a small crop! Picking will be available off and on throughout the summer – it varies depending on weather and crowds – feel free to call ahead, or watch our facebook and twitter pages for daily updates.

New! Homegrown Vegetables

New this year—we are growing summer vegetables and flowers! We harvested our first zucchini today, and will have squash, tomatoes, bell peppers, green beans, and cut flowers in our market most of the summer. Farm fresh, local, homegrown—and all delicious and beautiful! Check out our selection next time you stop in!

Baby tomatoes - vegetables at Chiles Peach Orchard

Tomatoes, and other vegetables, grown at Chiles Peach Orchard will be available in the Farm Market

Ready-Picked Lodi Apples Available Soon

Our apple crop in Crozet is looking very good so far!

Summer apples—our first Lodi apples will be available (already picked) within the next few days. These are wonderful for frying, cooking, and applesauce. They will be in season for about 2-3 weeks, so if you are a fan, you’ll want to stop in soon!

We anticipate our first pick-your-own apples in mid-August – but stay tuned for updates throughout the summer.

Pumpkins to be Planted This Week

Our pumpkins are being planted this week (so no frost damage as of yet!!). With lots of hard work, luck, and help from Mother Nature, our pumpkin patch will open in mid-September.

Stay tuned to our social media pages for updates throughout the summer!

Surprise! We’re Open This Weekend

Posted by :Franziska Matiuk On : June 3, 2016
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Surprise! We found some cherries you can pick! Mother Nature hid some and we found them this week. We’ll be open June 3-5, as well as June 9-12 from 9AM – 5PM for picking!

Be sure to like us on Facebook to get all the latest news and picking updates.

We’re Not Opening for a 2016 Cherry Season and Here’s Why

Posted by :Cynthia Chiles On : May 25, 2016
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In the orchard business, we can control a lot of things. The weather, however, isn’t one of them. Mother Nature has the final say, and she determined that we didn’t need any sweet cherries at Spring Valley this year. While we don’t agree with her thinking, all we can do is go along with it.

The winter of 2016 was one of the warmest in a while, and our fruit trees showed it. Trees bloomed 3 weeks earlier than last year, and while that seems like a welcome entrance to spring, farmers know that it can mean problems later. While it’s not unusual to have some sub-freezing temperatures in April, it’s not normal for the trees to be as advanced as they were this year. Our cherry trees in particular were in their most vulnerable stage, with the blossoms fully opened (and unable to protect the embryo cherry inside).

Some of the damage was visible immediately (the blossoms turned brown, a sure sign). We did hold out hope for a while for a partial crop, as some of the cherries continued to develop and seemed that they had survived. However, the cold temperatures proved to be too much for them. The cherries grew for a couple of weeks, and then started falling to the ground. We are left with trees with no fruit for this year.

While we may have a few cherries that we can sell as already picked, there are not nearly enough to open Spring Valley Orchard for pick your own cherries this year. We’ll miss seeing you, and hope you will visit us at Carter Mountain Orchard and Chiles Peach Orchard. We’ll be back strong, Mother Nature willing, in 2017.

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P.O. Box 229
Batesville, VA 22924
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