Chazy Orchards: celebrating 100 years of apples

CHAZY | On a crisp morning spattered with rain, the apple harvest, washing and packing at Chazy Orchards generate a kind of warmth that promises winter stores. Marking a centennial this year, the apple farm and its Giroux family stewards are growing steadily into the next 100 years. Craig and Willie Giroux, principles of Giroux Poultry, purchased Chazy Orchards from the Green family in 2010. Continued innovation has added apple varieties and efficiency to keep pace with increasing harvest. Celebrating a hundred years in farming on the same land is a rarity in its own right. But apple orchards here produce an average 12,500 bushels of the fruit per day. That equates to about 1,250,000 apples picked every day at Chazy Orchards in harvest season. With an eye on operations, Ely Giroux, 27, works with orchard mapping planned three to five years ahead, drawing from the farm's history to take each step forward. An affinity for growing apples began early, Ely said in an interview with The Sun. "I grew up in the orchards and worked on the farm. After college, this provided a good opportunity to explore ways to modernize and add some automation that makes it easier for our workers. We are always focused on new plantings and new varieties of apples to provide what people want most." SweeTango and Honey Crisp are popular varieties, he said. Their farm grows 10 varieties in all. Ely and Barbara Giroux, his mom, provided the Sun a tour of Chazy Orchards' Route 9 farm store; their apple washing, sorting and packaging plant; and their new Controlled Atmosphere (CA) storage facility. Apples on these fields that stretch to the edge of Lake Champlain are primarily grown for grocery sales and markets, Mrs. Giroux said. At most, 10 to 20 percent are culled for cider production. Chazy Orchards started pressing their own cider two years ago. "Most of our apples are marketed on the east coast," she said of Chazy's reach in distribution. "I've found our apples in Florida." "We keep growing what people want," Ely said. "I think adding new and different apples helps create a competitive edge." Managing vast fields of apple trees and a state-of-the-art production line is an engaging profession. "It is a lot of fun," Ely said. "You learn something new every day, every year." McINTOSH FOR THE D&H Chazy Orchards is one of largest producers of McIntosh apples in the world. And these orchards were among the first to grow the crisp, hardy fruit for mass market sale. The first apple trees were planted from 1924 to 1928 by the Delaware & Hudson Railroad to protect mineral rights for its subsidiary, the Chazy Lime Co., according to a pictorial history compiled by Jeffrey Green. There were over 43,000 trees in the original planting, including 29,000 McIntosh. At harvest time, apples were hauled back to Boston, New York City and cities in New Jersey where Fancy McIntosh Red Apples sold in cartons of 96 count for $2.35. It was a reliable crop then as now. Success with McIntosh has a lot to do with the climate, Ely said. "They thrive through cold winters and cooler summers." HAIL NETTING Changeable weather is an age-old challenge for farmers. To address particularly biting blasts of hail that come lately with big summer storms, Chazy Orchards has added use of hail netting with a product called Drape Net. Like long curtains placed over rows of apple trees, nets are deployed with special rollers pulled behind a tractor. Ely said the unique fabric allows sunlight through yet stops hail from impacting the fruit. Their nets are installed when bloom and pollination are done and kept in place until apples are ready for harvest. Drape Net also helps protect the fruit from insect and bird damage, Ely explained. Chazy Orchards is a primary distributor of Drape Net in North America. CA EXPANSION Expansion of storage this year aims at keeping pace with Giroux's increased apple harvest. "This is the new CA barn, it's just being finished," Mrs. Giroux said, opening a wide door into a pristine, high-tech environment. The new Controlled Atmosphere (CA) storage facility runs a length of several hundred feet behind the packaging plant. State-of-the-art, 13 new CA storage rooms keep apples at around 3 percent oxygen. Each room's environment is controlled and monitored with advanced computer systems. Chazy Orchards' penchant for innovation pioneered use of CA to augment cold storage under stewardship of the Green family in 1957. The low oxygen level in the storage room allows apples to remain sweet and ripe for nine or 10 months. Capacity means apple packaging and sales sustain throughout the year. SORTING APPLES The packaging facility is a short distance from the CA barn, and it's an eye-popping hub of activity. An automated arm slowly raises boxes of just-picked apples, releasing them into a conveyor tank that carries the batch through different lines that wash, dry, polish and sort each apple according to size and grade. To measure quality, apples roll under a bar of flickering lights that tests for color and weight. A second light bar checks every apple for internal browning, culling for cider and other uses. Stickers are placed on each prime apple in the process. Apples sorted for market sale are packed by hand in trays or bags, and then stacked in boxes for distribution. The entire production line is monitored from a loft that overlooks the entire production line and tracks apple batches with computer monitors. OPEN HOUSE Chazy Orchards employs approximately 250 people during harvest season and continues a long-held tradition of hiring offshore workers. The Green family began providing seasonal job opportunities for people from the British Virgin Islands in 1956. Ely said many long-term employees stayed with Chazy Orchards through the change in ownership. The transfer of stewardship was a smooth process, Mrs. Giroux said. "The transition was great. The Green family were good stewards of the orchards for a very long time." Chazy Orchards is hosting an Open House celebration on Oct. 5, starting at 10 a.m. to celebrate their centennial. Tours of the packaging and CA facilities will run throughout the day. The farm store with a wide variety of apples will be open for visitors to enjoy along with fresh doughnuts and cider, food from Tammy's Lunch Box food truck and live music. Chazy Orchards is located at 9486 Route 9 in Chazy. To find out more about the local apple growers, visit their website: chazy.com

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Chazy Orchards: celebrating 100 years of apples

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