Join Us on Tuesday August 9^th for LOF's Summer Tour in Orleans County!

The Lake Ontario Fruit Team of Cornell Cooperative Extension is pleased to announce that our full agenda is set for our annual summer tour, featuring cutting edge farms in Orleans County on Tuesday, August 9^th.  The use of technology in precision crop load management will be highly featured on several stops. In addition, pest/disease management and horticulture will also be covered. There will also be a berry stop (blueberries). The tour begins with registration and programming at the first stop at 8 AM and finishes at the final stop at approximately 4:45 PM. An ice cream social is being planned immediately following at the last stop. 1.75 NYSDEC credits will be offered in categories 1A, 10, and 22.

Bring hats, sunscreen, and chairs!

Cornell LOF Summer Fruit Tour Agenda

Stop 1: Kast Fruit Farm, 14931 Zig Zag Rd, Albion, NY 14411. Stop leader: Janet van Zoeren.

  8am DEC credit sign-in and Registration

  8:30am Welcome and Housekeeping, Craig Kahlke

  8:33am Introduction to their Farm Business, Brett Kast. Janet will introduce Brett and he'll explain the history of this large farm. 

  8:38am "2 years of Data on Pre-emergent Herbicide Application Timing", Janet van Zoeren. Janet will present her and Mike Basedow's findings on 2 years of research, and attendees will be able to see the plots in their third year of study.

  8:53am "Mating Disruption: it's a good time to re-consider how it fits on your farm", Dr. Monique Rivera, Cornell University. Meet Dr. Monique Rivera, new tree fruit Entomologist at Cornell AgriTech. Monique was hired after Dr. Art Agnello's retirement. Monique will present and lead a conversation on mating disruption and why it is worthwhile to experiment with and eventually implement. 

  9:13am  " Orchard Soil Health - From Testing to Opportunities", Dr. Deborah Aller, Cornell University. Dr. Aller is a long-time Extension Associate formerly with CCE-Suffolk who has recently joined Cornell's Soil Health Program on campus. Debbie will cover how healthy soil is the foundation of productive resilient farms that require fewer inputs such as nutrients and pesticides. This presentation will show growers how to collect soil health samples in an orchard, share preliminary results of a statewide orchard sampling effort, and what management strategies they might implement to improve the health of the soil. 

  9:38am " Fire Blight in the 2022 season", Dr. Kerik Cox, Cornell University. Kerik will cover the development of Fire Blight in the 2022 season. The presentation will include possible causes of epidemics and management options for the present and following seasons.

9:53am "2 Rootstocks comparison for NY1" by Dr. Terence Robinson, Cornell University. Attendees will have an opportunity to see a side-by-side comparison of NY-1 trees on M.9 Nic29 (planted in 2018) versus NY-1 trees on G.41 (planted in 2019). Participants will walk to a second comparison of NY-1 trees grown on M.26 versus G.935 rootstocks (both planted in 2016). All NY-1/rootstock combinations were established at 3x12ft.  In addition, Crunch Time board member Brett Kast will talk about future plans for SnapDragon™.

10:10am-10:20am: Travel to Stop 2.

  Stop 2: Fish Creek Orchards, 1760 Oak Orchard Road, Albion NY 14411. Stop leader: Mario Miranda Sazo.

  10:30am Intro to Fish Creek Orchard business model, by co-owners Jason Woodworth and Jose Iniguez.

  10:35am "SCRI Project Overview", by Dr. Terence Robinson, Cornell University. Terence will give a brief background on his 4 year SCRI Grant, "Precision Orchard Management in Apple".

  10:40am Precision Tree Fruit Technology, part 1.  Dr. Yu Jiang of Cornell will discuss Cornell's work with the Moog rover, which will be on display at the farm. Inc.

  10:50am Precision Tree Fruit Technology, part 2. Jenny Lemieux of Vivid Machines, Inc. will outline her group's work on precision crop load management in apples in grower trials, including their work with Fish Creek.

  11:00am Precision Tree Fruit Technology, part 3. One or more representatives from Green Atlas or MyCloud cartographers in the US) will outline their work on precision crop load management in apples with Dropcopter in grower trials conducted recently in NY.

  11:10am "SCRI Engineering Work Overview and the Future of DA Technology Adoption in NYS", by Yu Jiang, Cornell University. Yu will update us on the progress that's been made in partnering with other companies on the engineering objectives in the project. In addition, Yu will announce the digital agriculture trials for adoption (DATA) initiative at Cornell and in close collaboration with the CCE system. The new initiative plans to implement a product trial program to comprehensively evaluate key DA tools on the market for various critical issues in NYS agriculture and provide fair, objective product review reports to NYS stakeholders for adoption.

  11:30am "Computer Vision for Rapid and Accurate Disease Scouting and Management in Apple Orchards", by Dr. Awais Khan, Cornell University. Results will be discussed from a project funded by Cornell Initiative for Digital Agriculture (CIDA), to "train" computer vision models for the detection and identification of foliar diseases of apple. The long-term goal of this research is to develop a computer vision-based system for automatic identification of the most common diseases in apple orchards.

11:55am-12:00pm: Travel to Stop 3.

Stop 3: Carlton Fire Co. Recreation Hall, 1853 Oak Orchard Road, Albion NY 14411. Stop leader: Craig Kahlke.

12:00-1:30 pm

Enjoy networking and lunch, provided by Frank Penna Catering. Receive DEC credits. Hear sponsors introduce themselves and mention new products and services, and direct folks to their display tables. Growers and other tree fruit industry folks will have the opportunity to visit with sponsors and likely view several demonstrations of new precision crop load management technology, along with other equipment and products.

1:30-1:35pm - Drive to Stop 4.

Stop 4: Orchard Dale Fruit Co. , 1321 Oak Orchard River Road, Waterport NY 14571. Stop leader: Craig Kahlke.

  1:40pm Intro to Orchard Dale Fruit Co., by Eric Brown & Robert Brown III.

  1:45pm "Intro to SCRI Pruning Severity Experiments", by Dr. Terence Robinson, Cornell University. Terence will explain the objectives behind these trials that are being repeated in many states. Craig will discuss the work performed in this block.

  1:53pm Precision Tree Fruit Technology, part 4. A representative from Fruit Scout will outline his group's work on precision crop load management in apples in grower trials in the US. Craig will show their trunk measurement and fruitlet sizing work with Fruit Scout, including ground truthing measurements.

  2:03pm Precision Tree Fruit Technology, part 5.  A representative from Farm Vision will outline his group's work on precision crop load management in apples, including several trials with other growers in Western NY. Anna Wallis from MSU Extension will also share her work and MI growers work with Farm Vision as well. Craig will share the results of the fruit scans and ground truthing measurements. 

    2:15-2:20pm Drive to blueberries.

2:30pm  "Optimizing blueberry plantings for mechanical harvest", by Anya Osatuke, Harvest NY. Using mechanical harvesters provides important labor savings in blueberry production, but requires plantings to be initiated and maintained with harvester use in mind. Anya will go over soil preparation, site layout, variety selection, weed control, and post-harvest processing, all in light of a planting aimed for mechanical harvest.

2:50pm Precision Tree Fruit Technology, part 6.  Quinton Vercruysse will discuss Orchard Dale's work with Outfield. Attendees can view the Minnieska™ block in which the trial was done.

3:00pm Spanish Leadership Training - Mildred Alvarado, Cornell Small Farms Program. Mildred will update participants about the current educational activities of CSFP and new training opportunities developed in partnership with CCE LOF and NYSIPM. A new call to register for the coming 'Futuro Financiero' class will be announced at the end of the stop.

3:25-3:35pm Drive to Stop 5.

Stop 5: Nesbitt Fruit Farm., 14509 Lakeshore Road, Waterport NY 14571. Stop leader: Mario Miranda Sazo.

3:40pm Nesbitt Fruit Farms Intro and Business plan, Shane Nesbitt.

3:45pm On-farm nursery production with the 'grow-through' tree strategy, Terence, Mario, and Shane. At this stop tour participants will be introduced to the 'Grow-through' apple tree production method on a two- or three-year cycle. Scion/rootstock combinations of Honeycrisp/G.969, Honeycrisp/B.10, and Fuji/B.10 were all budded on August 2020 and will be in display with trellised rows. There will be a discussion of bench grafted trees produced in 2021 of Gala/G.210, Gala/G.214, and Honeycrisp/G.969 at the end of the stop.

4:10pm Drive to Honeycrisp block.

4:25pm The use of the Pollen Tube Growth Model for bloom thinning in Honeycrisp, along with PTGM updates from the Peck Lab- Shane, Terence, Mario, Peck Lab.

4:40pm Educational program adjourns. 

  4:45 pm All are welcome to join immediately following for an Ice Cream Social under cover! This is a 2 minute walk from the Honeycrisp block.