The garden is a Memorial Garden, a garden of benevolence, a garden of love. It is a gift to our community from the God of Love, Jesus the Christ. The first “seeds” for our garden have come from members of the congregation and a designation from the congregation’s memorial funds. These seeds have brought us to the beginning of a journey that will last for many years. Guided by the Holy Spirit we will plow forth until row upon row of our work is accomplished and our community is better nourished. The Lord invites you all to be part of His work on earth strengthening and feeding His children. The garden is made possible by generous donations from the community, and grants from the ELCA Domestic Hunger Grants, the Alaska Food Policy Council through the Municipality of Anchorage, the Alaska Women's Giving Circle, The Alaska Master Gardeners of Anchorage, the generous support by the congregation of Lutheran Church of Hope, and support from the Alaska Synod of the ELCA.

Food from the garden in 2019 was sent to Lutheran Social Services Food Pantry, the Tudor Road Gospel Rescue Mission, and to Bean's Cafe.

Tuesday, June 9, 2020

The Apple Orchard

Orchard Planting
There are two apple trees in front of the parsonage (State Fair and Norland) that were planted by Pastor Ottum while he and his family lived there. These are mature trees that bear between 150 and  300 pounds of apples each year. These trees need to be pruned severely to make them easy to harvest and better producers. Each year I work on them a little more.

There are two trees inside the garden fence (State Fair and Carroll). I grafted them onto hardy root stock the spring of 2017. They were about 18 inches tall when I planted them. One was pulled out by vandals late in October of 2017. I put it back in the ground but the ground was  mostly frozen. This tree did not survive. The lonely survivor will bear some fruit in 7 or 8 years. The survivor is about three feet tall now.
Blossoms Closeup

Five trees north of the garden (Norland, Zestar, and Prairie Magic) will produce a harvest in 3 to 4 years. If they all survive and produce well we could be harvesting 300 to 400 pounds of apples in the coming years. Three of the "orchard" trees did produce some apples in 2018. The Prairie Magic has very tasty fruit. The trees had a bad year in 2019. June and July were very dry. I did not water the trees and they suffered from the lack of water. The only apples on them were very hard and very small.

Parsonage Apple Tree 2018
The orchard is fenced the same as the garden to keep the hungry moose out in the winter. They don't seem to bother the trees in the summer time. The fence is 7.5 ft. tall so should keep them out.

As expected only one of the trees has any blossoms in 2020. The Prairie Magic has blossoms but it's too early to tell if there will be any fruit. Hope springs eternal. The blossoms on the parsonage trees are sparse this year as well. Hopefully we will still get some apples from the trees. If not the goal of 4500 lbs for 2020 will be very difficult to reach.

Sometime in the future I may try my hand at making cider. There should be plenty of apples to press. This is another investment in equipment so only time will tell.
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