Dates!

No, not the kind you eat, the kind you put in your calendar. I just got off the phone with my Extension advisor (love ya', Mike!) and he tells me that the best, most super-optimal picking weekends will be the last weekend in September and the first weekend in October. Apparently, this applies to Empires and Red Delicious.

This is news to me, as I had been told that Reds are usually ready a week or two after Empires. But I suspect that we can chalk this difference up to the general disagreements between farmers and agricultural researchers. I won't go into gory detail here, but let's just say that there's a dissertation's worth of material in the clashing of those two cultures.

So mark your calendars! September 26-27 and October 3-4 are going to be the best for picking. I'll send out an email to that effect soon. And I will also warn you that the absolute last day to pick will probably be October 11th. After that, I'll have to hire guys to get the rest of the fruit off the trees quickly.