Our Commitment

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Oohashi Cherry Orchard’s commitment

 Ohashi Cherry Orchard’s Commitment 1: Emotions found in all living things

In order for the cherry trees to grow quickly and healthily, we play gentle music to the cherry trees.

 Oohashi Cherry Farm’s commitment 2: We will return what we have picked.

By fermenting cherry fruit to produce fruit enzymes and spraying them on the leaves, we enhance the cherry tree’s natural healing power.

 Oohashi Cherry Orchard’s specialty 3: Rich trace elements in wood vinegar

By burning charcoal during the winter and feeding the trees with wood vinegar extracted from the charcoal, we provide trace elements that tend to be lacking. Wood vinegar also has pest repellent properties.

 Ohashi Cherry Orchard’s Commitment 4: Thorough Mowing

We are trying to keep pests out of our cherry fields as much as possible by thoroughly mowing the grass and keeping the ground well-ventilated.

 Ohashi Cherry Orchard’s specialty 5: Mineral-rich deep ocean water

By incorporating nutrients in a well-balanced manner, crops will grow vigorously and will be less susceptible to diseases and insects.
Deep water collected from the ocean floor is rich in minerals that are often in short supply.

 Ohashi Cherry Farm’s special feature 6: Use of indigenous bacteria

We are working to protect cherries from harmful viruses and bacteria by cultivating useful indigenous bacteria that have lived in Ashibetsu, Hokkaido for thousands of years.

 Ohashi Cherry Orchard’s Commitment 7: “Creating golden living soil” to energize with oxygen

Cherry trees are trees that require a huge amount of oxygen.
From the time the harvest is finished until the snow starts falling, we work to pump oxygen into the soil.

 Ohashi Cherry Orchard’s Commitment 8: Unscientific fertilizer

I’m not saying that all chemical fertilizers are bad, but one of our commitments for about 40 years is this cultivation method that uses only organic fertilizers.

 Ohashi Cherry Farm’s Commitment 9: Safe and secure sustainable farming methods

In addition to the above, we are working on a variety of other initiatives to protect cherries from pests and disease while minimizing the use of chemicals, so that everyone can pick cherries with peace of mind.
■Avion farming method ■Herbal medicine spraying ■Amino acid extract spraying ■Natto bacteria spraying ■Herb planting

Creating golden living soil…delicious and safe cherries

Everyone wants food that is both delicious and safe.
But why do we feel that something as simple as “I want to eat safe foods with peace of mind” is difficult in today’s society?
The cherries we grow are consumed directly by our customers in the fields, so we have been pursuing safety for many years.

We at Ohashi Cherry Farm believe that above all, “If the trees are not healthy! ” I am thinking.
We have always been particular about “soil preparation” because we believe that healthy trees produce safe and delicious fruit.
The entire field is divided into 34 plots, and the mineral balance in the soil is analyzed and excess or deficiency is adjusted. By adjusting this mineral content, microorganisms and useful soil organisms will be active for the benefit of the trees. The tree is activated, resulting in mineral-rich cherries.
Also, all trees absorb not only nutrients but also oxygen through their roots.
If there is less oxygen in the soil, the tree will become sickly. Among fruit trees, cherry trees in particular require a huge amount of this oxygen. Furthermore, useful microorganisms in the soil cannot function actively without oxygen. At Ohashi Cherry Orchard, we work to pump oxygen into the soil from the time the harvest is finished until the snow begins to fall.
During the winter, I build a charcoal hut and make charcoal from rice husks for 3 to 4 months.
When charcoal is placed in a field, it adsorbs harmful substances, enriches the soil with oxygen, and also increases the number of beneficial microorganisms. Wood vinegar, a by-product from charcoal, revitalizes trees and increases their natural healing power.
And we have been growing for over 40 years using compost and organic fertilizers without using chemical fertilizers.
Although it is not financially cheap compared to chemical fertilizers, we believe that the rich mineral content contained in it not only makes it safe and delicious, but also produces healthy fruit.
We continue to focus on creating “golden living soil” that enables sustainable agriculture, and we believe that constantly considering the health of trees is the basis of producing safe and delicious cherries, and we will continue to promote various initiatives.

One Year at Ohashi Cherry Orchard

 End of winter

• Pruning work will be done around March (because there are many trees in our garden, pruning will be done from around late December to early April)
• Starting from March, the number of flower buds will be reduced by pruning in parallel with pruning. Reduce the number of flower buds on bouquet-like single fruit branches (clusters with many flower buds) to 2 or 3.

 Snow melts soon

• Planting seedlings

 When the flowers bloom

• It varies by region, but cherry blossoms are in full bloom from late April to early May (early to mid-May in Ashibetsu). Mating work is done when the flowers are in full bloom. Apply pollen from flowers of other varieties to the pistil to help the fruit set. Although pollen is applied manually using hair flycatchers, we also place many bee friends such as bees and beetle bees in the fields to help with pollination. In addition, we perform flower thinning work (thinning the number of flowers) to adjust the number of fruits.
• The grass will start to grow around this time. There are many insects hiding in the grass, so cut the grass in the field.

 About 15 days after flowering (when the fruit is still green)

• The flowers will fall, and soon many blue berries will appear on the cherry branches. There are many plants that do not catch pollen well, and many fall to the ground before they grow large. If you have time, it is better to pick up the fruits that are about to fall but do not fall by hand and let them fall so that they will not get sick.

 When the colors start to change

• When the cherries gradually get bigger and start to change color, birds come to eat them. Most of them are starlings, but crows and bulbuls have also started flying in recently. To prevent wild birds from eating your precious cherries, there are ways to prevent them from being eaten by wild birds, such as setting up a net, hanging a balloon with a picture of an eyeball on it, hanging a model of a peregrine falcon (a bird of prey) high on a branch, or using a gas gun to scare the birds, but if there are only a few cherries, the safest bet is to put a net over the entire tree.
• The best way for cherries to change color is to expose them to sunlight, but in order to provide enough light to the bottom of the cherry, which is less exposed to sunlight, place a silver sheet.
• If you add too much water to the cherries around this time, they will absorb water through the small holes on their surface and become punctured. At our farm, we build rain shelters to cover the entire field, but if there are only a few trees, we simply create a vinyl roof over the trees. Please be careful not to touch the vinyl directly to the leaves or fruit as it will burn due to the heat.

 Remove

• Cherry picking season in Ashibetsu is from early July to late August, but generally starts around early June in Honshu. In Hokkaido, it usually starts around late June and ends in late July or early August. Cherries are very delicate fruits, so they must be harvested very carefully.
• If you pick the fruit directly, the fruit will fall off. If you pick up the jiku and apply a shock to it, the taste will change.
• They ripen in order from the sunny spot, so you can’t pick them all at once. Select only the parts that look delicious. After a few days, the bland cherries will become delicious.

 Autumn

• 《Fertilization》Since young trees are very energetic, we do not apply any fertilizer at our garden, but if the rootstock is a green leaf stand or if it is planted in a place where there is no fertilizer, some fertilizer will be needed from the time of young trees. We grow our plants using only organic fertilizers.
• As the tree grows and becomes ready to harvest fruit, it becomes tired and requires more fertilizer.
• Organic fertilizer is recommended for areas with poor soil quality.
• If you apply too much fertilizer, only the leaves will grow and the flowers will not bloom.
• Fertilizer is often applied immediately after harvest, in autumn, and then in spring, but organic fertilizers decompose slowly, so in our garden we apply them all at once in autumn.

Winter

• In areas where there is a lot of snow, the trees are covered with snow, and the weight of the snow can cause important tree branches to break. We will remove the snow on a regular basis. Also, since the house is built entirely on a field, if snow accumulated in the rain gutters is left unattended, the house will collapse, so I sometimes climb on top of the house to shovel snow.

If you have any questions, please feel free to contact us.
Ohashi Cherry OrchardTEL:0124-23-0654
(Please be careful not to enter the wrong number)