Mounting a tradition

The Mount Continuing Care Community’s orchard has been picked clean, bring its second u-pick season to a close

The trees are short and the rows are wide enough for a golf cart at the Mount Continuing Care Community’s orchard, which opened its u-pick season on Oct. 4 and has already been picked clean.

The width and the height have to do with accessibility, said Lindsay Dickieson, administrator at The Mount.

“Everything we do here, whether it’s having a school, a day care, the gym, the apple orchard, it’s all focused around the resident. How is this going to enhance their quality of life?”

Begun in 2015, the orchard features three varieties of apples — ambrosia, gala and honey crisp, and one kind of pear — Harovin sundown.

This is the second year the dwarf tree orchard has produced enough apples to open it to the public.

And like most things at the Mount, the orchard is multipurpose.

As fresh produce, the apples are used to make food for residents at the Mount, including the day care and private academy.

Because the orchard is so new, it continues to be a learning experience, especially when it comes to dealing with nature.

Though Dorian only knocked over one tree, the orchard has lost more than 800 trees since last year, said owner Paul Jenkins.

“We had sudden apple death, so we lost a whole bunch of trees. And we lost a whole bunch over the winter for the first time due to mice,” he said.

The mice destroyed about 200 trees over the winter, possibly due to a decrease in the fox population.

The sudden apple death struck in late August taking over 600 trees, said Jenkins.

“[Sudden apple death] is just a fancy term for ‘they don’t know what caused it.’”

While the u-pick has finished early for the year, apples from the orchard are still being sold in the Mount's lobby.

A four-pound bag of readyto-eat apples is available for $10, while a five-pound bag of baking apples is $5.

For more information about the Mount and ways to contribute, visit www.themountcommunity.ca or www.facebook.com/ themountcommunity, or phone 902-370-8888.

MICHAEL ROBAR/THE GUARDIAN Eric and Vera Qiao put apples in their bin at the Mount Continuing Care Community’s orchard on Sunday. Their family volunteered through the P.E.I. Association for Newcomers to Canada to help the P.E.I. Food Exchange and Fusion Charlottetown.