When Farmington’s Kerby Orchard opened in 1945, there were 40 orchards in the San Juan River Valley. Trains, at the time, hauled about 1 million pounds of apples from the valley to New York annually.
Seventy-three years later, only one orchard remains, said Leslie Kerby, son of the orchard’s founder, Tom Kerby.
“When I say we’re the last orchard, that means – sure you have mom and pops that are school teachers during the day and have an acre of trees in their backyard or 20 fruit trees or something – but we’re a real orchard that that’s our livelihood,” he said.
The orchard produces a lot more than just apples.
“We grow 15 kinds of apples, 10 kinds of peaches, about five kinds of pears, five kinds of nectarines, 10 kinds of plums and prunes, apricots, sweet cherries and pie cherries,” Kerby said.
The business has changed over time.
“Years ago, everyone bought bushels and canned, but that art is kind of coming back,” he said. “I’ve noticed a trend where there’s more people learning to can and interested in food storage again.
“You have to learn what people want. And you can’t just grow a tree and have that fruit the next year. So you learn what they’re going to want, the hot apple, whether you want to grow them, and then it’s a popular apple for quite a while.”
What’s today’s hot apple? Gala is No. 1 in the nation, having just overtaken Red Delicious this year, Kerby said. Gala’s reign may be limited, though.
Honeycrisp is No. 2 and rising.
ngonzales@durangoherald.com
