DECEMBER 2016 • COUNTRY LIFE IN BC How’s them apples?
BC growers blossom at the Royal and bring home national awards
by DAVID SCHMIDT TORONTO – British
Columbia may not have the most apples in Canada but they certainly have some of the best.
BC apples again captured many of the top spots at the National Apple Competition at the Royal Agricultural Winter Fair (RAWF) in Toronto. The annual event attracts entries from Nova Scotia, Quebec, Ontario and BC. BC topped three of the nine commercial apple categories and all four of the new varieties categories. Leading the way was Dave Machial of Fairview Orchards in Oliver. Machial and his parents, Joe and Anna, have grown top-quality apples, cherries and soft-fruits since 1979. A director of the Summerland Varieties Corporation who entered the RAWF competition for the first time this year, Machial earned first-place honours in the Red Delicious and Royal Gala categories and placed second in the Ambrosia category, which was dominated by BC growers.
Repeat winners
First place among Ambrosia apples went to Michel and Elma Labelle from
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the Naramata Bench area of Penticton. After starting off growing pears, prunes, cherries and older varieties of apples 35 years ago, they have more recently
concentrated on such newer varieties as Ambrosia and Royal Gala. They clearly have done very well at both as their Royal Galas also placed second in that category. These are not Labelle’s first accolades, having received the BC Fruit Growers Association’s prestigious Golden Apple Award for sound horticultural practices in 2013.
Other BC winners at the RAWF competition were Billy and Shauna Boerboom of Windmill Growers in Summerland (Golden Delicious), Kashmir and Kulwinder Bengag of the Mariposa Fruit Stand in Keremeos (Aurora Golden Gala), Dave, Arlene and James Sloan of Matheson Creek Farms in Okanagan Falls (Salish) and Jad Nijer of Nijer Family Farms in Kelowna (Nicola).
BC not only grows good apples, but grows them big. Devon Jell of Summerland won the title for the Heaviest Apple at the competition, a Honeycrisp apple weighing in at 1.9 kg.
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First time winner! Davi Machial’s Red Delicious and Royal Galas were the judges’ favorites this year at the Royal Winter Fair in Toronto. FAIRVIEW ORCHARDS PHOTO
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