Apples, under control

Amigos de la Manzana requests to reveal the origin of cider apples.

LA SIDRA.- David Menendez, president of the C.S.A.M. (Apple Friends Club from Siero), considers that the origin of cider apples used for cidermaking must be shown in the bottle label.

This could restrain the purchase of apples from outside Asturias, and so avoid them to end up rotten in our apple orchads, in years with harvest excess like this one.

According to Enrique Dapena, manager of the SERIDA Fruit Farming Investigation Programme, another measure to be taken would be to control the “veceria” (alternating harvests), though it would mean new machinery and a better knowledge by harvesters.

A pruning which reduces flowering spots, as well as tree plantation in two consecutive years so that production does not concentrate only in one, are other measures to be taken into account.

On his part, Jorge Garcia, technical director of Campoastur vegetal production, suggests the tecnique of thinning in a colective way. This treatment must be applied in June, when the fruit is still small, and it consists of removing the excess of fruit so that the one kept grows bigger.

But this is an expensive system which also requires pruning and mulching.