Boulder’s apple season is here. Why buying local matters for the future of Colorado orchards.

Colorado’s peak apple season is officially underway, with the first bushels hitting farmers markets since mid-August. Boulder County orchards are expanding their hours and offering more you-pick opportunities. Apple cider donuts, dried fruit, jams and juices are also back on the menu.

With more than 110 Colorado-grown apple varieties available in the county, either directly from orchards or at farmers markets, consumers have a wide array of choices and flavors far beyond what’s found in retail stores.

However, behind the scenes, apple production in Colorado is declining overall, according to industry reports and interviews. An offhand comment about orchards pulling up apple trees and leaving land fallow led Boulder Reporting Lab to dig deeper, meeting with farmers to understand what the community can do to keep state-grown apples available.

The answer, it turns out, is simple: Buy directly from a farmer.

Colorado growers face challenges in competing with large grocery store chains. Prices for fresh, locally grown apples range from $3 to $6 per pound, with discounts often available for “seconds” — the imperfect or blemished fruit. In comparison, retailers are selling imported apples this week for $1.49 to $3.50 per pound.

“Apple acreage in Colorado has been on a steep decline for the last 25 years,” said Jeni Nagle, the farmers market coordinator and accounts manager for Ela Family Farms, a family-owned organic farm located in Hotchkiss on the Western Slope. She said she has seen farms pulling up swaths of apple trees due to unfavorable economics. If they replant, they often choose peaches or wine grapes, which are more profitable.

“Apples are a commodity crop, so it’s very hard for us to compete with Washington state because those farms have become huge conglomerates and are super-efficient,” Nagle said. Commodity crops are mass-produced and sold cheaply, disadvantaging smaller farms.

To put things in perspective, according to data from the U.S. Apple Association:

• Total apple production in the U.S. is around 260 million bushels, with each bushel containing 42 pounds of apples.
• Washington state alone is expected to produce 155 million bushels for the 2024-25 season.
• Colorado isn’t even mentioned among the top producers in the U.S. Apple Association’s report from Aug. 20.
• Besides Washington, the leading apple-growing states are New York (31 million bushels), Michigan (30.5 million), Pennsylvania (11.5 million), California (5.5 million), Virginia (4.8 million), and Oregon (3.6 million).
• In comparison, China is the top apple producer globally, with a staggering 2.1 billion bushels and is also the leading exporter.

“We can’t compete with pricing, shipping, or distribution. So in Colorado, in order for us to keep apple trees in the ground, growers typically need to sell directly to their customers,” said Nagle.

Similar to local restaurant operators, farmers in the state are also experiencing a financial squeeze that affects their ability to stay in business. Between 2017 and 2022, Colorado lost 2,837 farms, including orchards — 7% of the total — said Marilyn Bay, executive director of the Colorado Fruit & Vegetable Growers Association. “This is due to increased regulations, increased input costs, and most of all the difficulty and expense of securing employees willing to work on farms,” she said.

Despite statewide challenges, Boulder County orchards are sustaining their businesses with local buyers, keeping locally grown food an option.

How YA YA Farm & Orchard relies on direct-to-consumer sales

Sharon Perdue owns YA YA Farm & Orchard, an eight-acre property in Longmont that boasts 118 apple varieties, including original heirloom trees that were already there when she bought the century-old farm in November 2003. Perdue opened YA YA to the public in 2007 after spending several years transitioning from her career in finance to farming. In preparation for expanding her orchard, she visited more than 500 farms in New York state and tasted hundreds of apple varieties to carefully select.

In YA YA’s business model, most apple varieties aren’t sold at grocery stores or her farm stand; they’re reserved for you-pick customers. This is a win-win because it saves the orchard labor costs and the uncertainty of farm stand sales, while customers get the variety they want. The picking list opens in January and often fills up before the end of summer. Perdue closely monitors how many people can come and when, based on weather and other factors that affect crop production and ripening stages.

She said that a full apple crop is rare, but if apples are available, she continues to open the list and give people a slot. “It’s a guessing game with nature,” she said. “So I always say, if I have half my crop, it’s a great year.”

Because the crop’s survival until harvest is always uncertain, all you-pick activities are scheduled to finish by the end of September, as an early October freeze typically ruins everything on the trees, she said. “There’ve been two years since 2007 when I’ve had a full crop, where if you asked to pick, you got to pick.”

Perdue diversifies her products and is known for her secret-recipe apple cider donuts, which she developed and, laughing, said she would “take to the grave.” YA YA’s farm stand also offers pears, plums, cherries, flowers, pies and access to a menagerie of animals, including Percheron draft horses and peacocks.

Both Perdue and Nagle from Ela Family Farms talked extensively and passionately about the flavor variety of their apple selections. Going directly to an orchard or a farm stand gives people an opportunity to taste things they will likely never see in a store. These producers don’t pick early and don’t add wax to the skin. Over time, an apple naturally generates its own waxy peel, so depending on the timing and variety, a dull or shiny sheen is normal.

Looking for a deal? “Retailers can’t really do firsts and seconds well, and as you can imagine, they want you to buy the higher-priced items,” said Nagle. Firsts are store-quality apples, in good or great condition, while seconds are blemished or imperfect fruits sold at a discount, usually by the box.

“We do [seconds] on a grander scale because we have actually built a market of people that really love the idea of real-life, ugly fruit getting eaten and used for its intended purpose.” Ela is certified organic and a zero-fruit-waste farm that built a solar-powered commercial kitchen, where, she said, they “use every piece of fruit and turn it into something delicious.”

Perdue said she practices natural and organic methods and does not spray pesticides at YA YA but is not certified organic. She acknowledges price sensitivity in the market with small farms. “We have so many transplants here, and they come to our markets expecting prices to be what they were where apple trees are everywhere. We have to charge a premium because [there’s so much] that goes into growing apples out here, and the cost is not cheap.”

Each week, farmers pick what is at peak ripeness, and those varieties change often because of growing time, weather and unique characteristics. Freshly picked, intact apples store well for a month.

Where to find local growers selling in Boulder County

Farmers Markets

Ela Family Farms, based in Hotchkiss, launched the season with its Zestar! apples—a crisp and lightly flavored red apple, around 3 inches in diameter. Throughout the season, they will bring a curated selection of their 25+ apple varieties, including six organic heirloom apples, to the Boulder County Farmers Markets in Boulder and Longmont each Saturday. As each variety ripens, it’s picked for optimal flavor. You can find updates on what’s coming to market on their Facebook page and at the bottom of their main website.

Market visitors will also find Topp Fruits, another Hotchkiss farm, in Boulder on Wednesdays and in Longmont on Saturdays. First Fruit Organic Farms (Paonia) is in Boulder both Wednesdays and Saturdays. Ela and Topp sell firsts and seconds of their crops.

The farms offer pre-ordering. Shoppers can visit their websites to place advance orders for pickup, be among the first to arrive at the market to buy what you want, or gamble on availability.

Orchards

YA YA Farm & Orchard on Highway 66 in Longmont is open Tuesday through Sunday, from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m., with extended hours until 6 p.m. on Thursdays. There is no entrance fee, and visitors are welcome to bring a picnic and enjoy the grounds but must leave their four-legged friends at home since the orchard has its own animals.

Benevolence Orchard & Garden has apples, ciders, and other produce and herbs at its permaculture farm on Jay Road in Gunbarrel. They’re open from 10 a.m. to dusk, and the outdoor store is on the honor system for purchases.

Among the apples you’ll see this season: Gingergold, Sansa, Gala, Swiss Gourmet, Golden Supreme, Jonathan, Honeycrisp, Empire, Macoun, Northern Spy, Goldrush, and Cripp’s Pink.

The Apple Tree Project, meanwhile, exists to find and restore rare apple cultivations that are often found in residential neighborhoods in Boulder County. You can report your apple tree and have it added to their map, help classify varietals with DNA testing, or contribute to grafting projects.