Our Apples
Buy Freshly Picked DLC Apples
Visit us at Open Book Farm on Saturdays!
This season, DLC apples will be sold as part of the Open Book Farm’s CSA. The farm is also open to the public (members and non-members) for produce sales every Saturday morning, May-October from 9-11:30am. Check them out and enjoy their fresh produce and our freshly picked heritage apples!
Visit us at the Bethesda Farm Market on Sundays!
Buy our fresh apples, fresh-pressed, sweet cider and of course, a small selection of our hard ciders.
What’s in Season?
Click on this image for a full-page printable list of which varieties are in season throughout the year.
Apple Origins
Apples originated in the Tien Shan mountain region in eastern Kazakstan. Around 8,000 BC, nomadic hunter/gatherers began to settle and rely on the recent invention of agriculture for sustenance. As trade and military expeditions developed, apples began to spread from Kazakstan into the Middle East and then westward to Europe.
As apples have been cultivated over time, two main types of apples have emerged: cider apples and dessert apples. Cider apples are generally much more bitter than dessert apples and do not taste good until they are pressed into fresh juice or fermented into hard cider. Dessert apples are mainly used for eating fresh and baking. At DLC, we grow both dessert and cider apples, but you won’t find the apple varieties that we grow in grocery stores. We chose to grow specialized cider and baking apples- you can taste the difference between our apples and store-bought apples!
Our Apples
Our first 1000 trees were planted in 2001 and started producing fruit in 2005. Today, we have over 3,000 semi-dwarf trees in our nine-acre orchard and over forty-five apple varieties!
We use a low-spray style of treating the trees called Integrated Pest Management (IPM). We track what kinds of harmful bugs are in the orchard and only spray for those specific bugs. Additionally, we use pheromone traps, a mating disrupter for the bugs. As a result, we do not need to blanket the orchard with a much stronger, generalized pesticide. We do not spray with any organophosphates.
To check out our apple varieties visit The Apples.
Please like our Facebook page for updates on when the various apples ripen and are ready for picking (this varies somewhat year to year due to weather conditions).
www.distillerylaneciderworks.com