Fruitful Endeavor
Local orchard provides education for students endeavor
“No, no crocodiles,” Peel answered.
There were no sharks, either, but there were ospreys, herons and beavers, which are the most troublesome animals for the gardens and accompanying orchards.
At Henrietta Creek Orchard, the spring-fed ponds foster an abundance of wildlife, and the gardens and orchards nurture a plethora of visiting children and families. Planted by Ray and Sue Short in 1990, the orchards, located just east of Alliance Airport in Roanoke, yield summer peaches and fall apples, and the fall also brings buses of children from local school districts, who visit the farm to reinforce ideas introduced in their classroom.
This year, though, the fruit crops haven’t been good. A late freeze around Easter killed most of the peaches and wiped out most of the apples, said Sue Short. There are still enough apples on the bough to show school groups what the dwarf trees look like, and the garden vegetables — like carrots, peppers and various types of squash — are bright and visible.
October also means a flood of phone calls about pumpkins, although the orchard doesn’t have a pumpkin patch and Short said she doesn’t know where people are hearing the information.
“Boy, we’d have a lot of money if we had apples or pumpkins,” she said.
While completely devoted to the orchard now, the Shorts have had other jobs over the years. Sue Short, for example, worked as a computer operator for about 14 years and after getting carpal tunnel she drove a school bus and helped design children’s clothing for a business set up with one of her daughters.
Ray Short is a machinist who grew up in Fort Worth and had farming relatives. But no matter what jobs they had and no matter where they lived, even when they didn’t have as much land as the 11 acres they now have, they had gardens and trees.
“I guess it’s in my genes, that’s all I know,” Ray Short said.
When the Shorts planted their orchards in 1990, they chose dwarf apple trees that grew with the help of a trellis system. The small trees are easier to maintain, because no big ladders are necessary, and they don’t require as much land. After experimenting with types of apples, the Shorts settled on varieties that would grow well in Texas and produce fruit in the fall, like Fujis, Granny Smiths, Pink Ladies and Winesaps.
When the trees began producing fruit, around 1993, then the Shorts invited school groups and children’s organizations, like the Boy Scouts, to visit. Sue Short became a master gardener in 1999 to learn more about managing the various plants, and the orchard became a Tarrant County Master Gardeners Association Project for four years, which drew other master gardeners to come and volunteer on the land.
Peel was one such volunteer, and she is in her sixth year of helping at the orchard. She leads tours in the fall when school groups visit, and she said the rest of the year is spent with maintenance and care on the crops. She said she will volunteer as long as she can because she appreciates the Shorts opening their land to children.
“The first time I pulled a carrot out of the ground, I will never forget,” she said. “It was like I had done a magic trick. They could not believe carrots came from the ground.”
Along with various volunteers and six employees, the Shorts run two tours each morning during the school week from the beginning of September through the middle of October (or longer, if classes get rained out and need to be rescheduled). Families and groups can do pick-your-own with peaches and other fruits and vegetables in the summer, and Sue Short changes the voicemail system for the orchard frequently to let people know what’s available to take home.
Customers and field trips provide most of the income for the orchard, Sue Short said, and most of the maintenance is done by the owners and employees. When things are good, the farm pays for itself, but she admits her and her husband sometimes put their own money (from Social Security) into the operation.
There are no immediate plans to retire or turn the orchard over or sell it, Short said, but someday they would like to retire.
“We’re going to do it as long as we physically can. I enjoy doing it, but it is very tiring as you get older. We’re not spring chickens anymore,” she said.
Ray Short said the land itself is a bit bizarre; their house sits on the property, as does the Apple House (a house where tours can go through and see apple processing equipment and a bee hive, as well as buy fresh fried apple pies and cakes and preserves, among other things), but part of the property is commercially zoned, he said. Much of the surrounding land is also commercially zoned, and there is no real sewer and water system. The property relies on the natural springs for water.
Even if the Shorts sold the property in the future, he said, he wants to continue living the country life. Although the orchard isn’t far from Interstate 35, it feels far away from Fort Worth. Farming has its ups and downs, and one can never predict what’s going to happen, but Short said he knows for certain he’ll stay away from cities.
“When you get up in the morning and you sit up on the side of your bed, that’s a gamble,” he said. “When you put your clothes on and go to work, that’s a gamble. Life’s a gamble.”
