As usual the annual cycle started earlier in the year.
March
February/March, when the sap is at it’s lowest, is the time for the “potatura”. Cutting out all the inner growth to allow air to flow and thinning out the outer branches.
Two days in the car to get there, two more to get back. Weather permitting, we had two weeks to get it done.
It looks brutal but we’ve learnt from our neighbours over the years how to do it. A couple of examples of before and after:
We did of course have help but, unlike Rob and Helen two years ago, they proved to be unreliable workers.
Despite this ‘help’ we didn’t finish all the trees, leaving a few for Ioan to come and do after we’d left.
October
In September some friends took a look at our trees for us. They warned us, it didn’t look promising.
In October we inspected the trees in each zone and estimated the % of olives compared to a full crop.
Tree sizes: G=Grande, M = Media, P = Piccolo
G 20% G 1% G 15% G 30% M 80% G 50% G 20% G 20%
M 15% P 0% G 10% M 1% M 0% M 10% P 0% M 20% M 1% M 10% M 10% M 1% M 5%
M 25% P 0% P 30% M 30% M 1% P 90%
G 5% G 1% G 1% G 10% G 1% G 1% G 1% G 1% G 5%
M 20% M 1% M 5% M 10% M 1%
Disaster. For the second year in a row we didn’t have enough for a harvest. Some of the trees were so sparse we could have hand picked them in about a minute.
We talked to two commercial producers. They had the same story about low yields but they had just enough to justify harvesting. Some local trees had zero olives, others nearby were completely full. There was no relationship between those who’d done the potatura and those who hadn’t, so all our work in March was in vein. Mother nature.
We do have 2026 extra virgin olive oil though. We bought a supply from Francesco and Loredana, our next door neighbours.
This year’s label reflects:
- That it’s not Casa Angeletti ‘s olive oil, but at least it’s from trees we can see from our house in the same field.
- That we moved back to London this year. I captured the moment when Tower Bridge was open, with HMS Belfast in the foreground, whilst we walked the dogs across London Bridge.
