This week, 4th generation apple & pear grower Kaitlyn Thornton is back to share how we prepare the water lines in our orchards for the long, cold Central Washington winter ahead.
Our growers find JOY in constantly thinking ahead to be the best possible stewards of their land, equipment and fruit.
Video Transcript:
“Welcome back to another Farm Friday! I’m Kaitlyn Thornton. I’m a fourth generation apple and pear grower up in North Central Washington. Irrigation is a huge part of what we do. Water is what helps grow incredible fruit. We don’t have a lot of natural rainfall, so we have to pump a lot of our water through and at the end of the year. A lot of that water is still in those pipes, so we use this compressor right here. It pushes a lot of air through those water lines, through those pipes and actually gets that water out of there. If there was water left, it would freeze and expand, and a lot of times it can break a lot of pipes. We rent this. It pumps a lot of air through here and ends up in this valve right here. You can hear that kind of whistling sound, that’s all this drip line. There’s a bunch of holes all along here, and it’s pushing air out of there so there’s no more water. Some pretty essential things that we do at the end of harvest!”
