Behind the scenes at Witherslack Orchards in autumn

Production is in full swing at Witherslack Orchards where every apple that goes into their juice is picked and cleaned by hand. From first visiting in the spring, Sarah French returned to see autumn operations

Sam Reynolds is arm deep in apples. Well, their pulp to be precise. It is the first full week of production at Witherslack Orchards and the early stage of a season-long conveyor belt of fruit being harvested, cleaned, juiced and bottle.

They are coming in by the trailer-load moments after being picked, lying in crates, bobbing in a sink, waiting clean in tubs ready for the scratter.

Sam, 27, is the man in charge of operations, or head of juice as his job was called when he applied for it in 2019.

The business began around 20 years ago when two volunteers – Mike Walford and Adele Jones – approached the owner of the Witherslack Hall Estate, Nick Stanley. The orchards had been there for hundreds of years but with some trees in a sorry state and no plan for replanting they asked if they could set out to rejuvenate them and bring them back into use for apple harvesting.

Sam Reynolds (Image: Sarah French) “They started very much as a kitchen table enterprise, initially providing enough juice for themselves then slowly taking over the orchard,” explains Sam.

In time they were producing 500 litres a year, enough to offer a regular supply to Witherslack community shop and other small, local retailers. “They gradually built it up as far as they could, but by 2019 they were ready to hand it over. My brother used to work in the wood yards on the estate and suggested I applied for the job as head of juice; now I just say general manager,” Sam says.

“Initially it was a part time role in production and managing that side of the business, which I did for a year alongside Mike and Adele to learn to the ropes. Then after the first season, which runs from April to September, I took over the reins.”

He says he was “in the right place at the right time” having just left the Royal Navy and working part-time at the Hazelmere café in Grange-over-Sands, which Mike and Adele used to supply with the juice.

One of the Halecat estate orchards (Image: Sarah French) “I don’t think anyone ever said at school that they wanted to press apples and make juice for a living, but I was interested in the challenge and had ambitions to move it forward.”

Mike and Adele had operated from a small unit close to their house with all proceeds going back into what is now a limited company, Witherslack Orchards, to maintain the trees or to replace or buy better equipment.

Now the business is based at Halecat where production takes place in part of a barn.

In his first year, Sam produced 600 litres, or 800 750ml bottles, of apple juice or the premium apple and damson juice, which is created using damson syrup that sweetens some of the tarter apples. Adele used to make the syrup, so now Sam does that as well.

“I’m in my sixth season but it’s still a learning curve. People come to me with questions and sometimes I know the answer straightaway but sometimes they ask me about apple varieties. I could rattle of a list of names but some of them are very obscure.”

Apple blossom in the spring (Image: Sarah French) The 800-hectare Witherslack Hall Estate comprises the largest area of semi natural woodland in Cumbria. Witherslack Orchards manages 12 orchards of varying sizes amounting to a total of 17 acres containing 500-700 trees, including some very old damson trees for which the valley is known.

Sam also juices donated apples and goes out to ten named orchards to harvest, resulting in around 100 different varieties of apple. Boarbank Nursing Home at Allithwaite has an orchard, and he also visits properties at Crosthwaite in the Lyth valley, Staveley and Levens Hall.

“It can be anything from a single apple tree whose owner doesn’t want to see the fruit go to waste or a small orchard of 20-30 trees,” he explains.

He is the only full-time employee, which works until harvest and production season, which requires all hands on deck. Everything happens in a two to three-month window from end of August.

Andrew Jopson shakes off the next bucketload (Image: Sarah French) At that time he needs help which comes in the form of Andrew Jopson, who is employed by the estate, short-term seasonal staff and volunteers including Sam’s and Andrew’s parents. New staff this season include Anna Lynch, from Kent’s Bank, a woodland ecology student at the University of Cumbria in Ambleside, and Jane Thwaites, from Allithwaite, who is retired.

Among the helpers are some who come via Worldwide Opportunities on Organic Farms (WWOOF), which links visitors with organic farmers, promotes an educational and cultural exchange and builds a global community of people who support ecological farming practices.

READ MORE: Things you can make with your autumn apple harvest

Apple picking, says Sam, is easy using a machine that shakes the tree then the fruit is gathered by rolling together with a stick. Alternatively Andrew uses a prop high in the branches and gives the tree a good shove.

Some orchards are left unmown during the summer which provides a soft landing for the fruit but makes collecting the apples more tricky. Anna prefers to gather sitting on a low stool while Jane modus operandi is to “crawl around on hands and knees”.

Jane Thwaites (left) and Anna Lynch picking apples (Image: Sarah French) Damsons are harder to harvest, invariably requiring a ladder. “Andrew and I have done the safety training, but the trees are sometimes on rocky or rough ground, so it is more time consuming,” says Sam. Last year they harvested 1,200 kilogrammes of damsons, this year is likely to be considerably less. It has been a bad harvest and whilst Sam has enough to make his syrup, he will be using every last fruit.

Previously, picking has taken place from Monday-Wednesday, processing on Thursdays and bottling on Fridays. “They are 8am-8pm days, it gets very congested. Apples don’t freeze well but some varieties will keep in cold store for quite a long time,” explains Sam.

This year, with a slightly larger team he has been able to introduce a small extra press earlier in the week, the juice from which has been frozen, allowing them to expand production and extend it over a longer period of time.

Every apple is washed, and any bruising or blemishes cut away, by hand. New recruit Stuart Bricklebank has been mastering the art this season.

Apples ready for picking (Image: Sarah French) The ‘scratter’ machine then pulps the fruit before it is transferred into the hydropress to squeeze out the juice into buckets. It is then poured by hand into one of two 800 litre tanks and stored overnight. “Our minimum is to fill one, but ideally both tanks,” says Sam. “But once the juice is in there it has to be bottled, so freezing some relieves that congestion.”

The juice is stored to allow the sediment to sink to the bottom then it is pumped out through two filters and into a gravity-fed bottling machine. Each bottle is handled and lids go on, lightly at first. The bottles then go into the pasteuriser for 20 minutes at 72C, which gives the juice a two-year shelf life unopened.

Once the lids are screwed on fully, the bottles go in a cold bath and are stored ready for labelling, which is all done by hand.

Last year, production peaked at 4,300 litres. “It was a combination of refining the process. With just two volunteers previously and getting some help in it wasn’t as streamlined as it could be; they would pick in the morning and process in the afternoon.

Another trailerload of apples (Image: Sarah French) “Now we do as big a pick as we can knowing the maximum capacity we can process, supplemented by better equipment such as a bigger pasteuriser which works faster, and at least a third pair of hands.”

The waste pulp goes back into the orchards as compost.

As soon as production finishes, ideally in early November to hit all the Christmas markets, although it can sometimes run into January, Andrew heads back to the orchards to begin winter pruning.

Sam hits the road with deliveries and to collect used bottles, which have to be de-labelled, while selling at seasonal and farmers’ markets. Witherslack Orchards has a regular stall on Kendal Farmers’ Market and fortnightly at Kirkby Lonsdale charter market. He also does the Lyth Valley Damson Day festival and Countryfest, at Crooklands. “I enjoy the outside aspects of the job, getting to know people, talking to customers at markets and when I’m delivering wholesale.”

The rest of his time is spent marketing and making damson syrup. Damsons do freeze well after their summer harvest, so syrup production is an off-season task that involves heating the fruit in water then hanging it in muslins overnight to extract the juice.

Andrew Jopson with the next crate of fruit (Image: Sarah French) “The day after I take the juice, add sugar and heat it, then bottle it ready to add it to the apple juice.”

Sam’s range of drinks is growing. He has also developed an elderflower cordial – a syrup base with steeped flowers and lemon – and a damson gin which is made traditionally by steeping the fruit with sugar in London dry gin for six months. He has also created small bottles of bramble gin and sloe gin.

His experiments haven’t stopped there. Still using foraged produce, he has created wild garlic salt and a wild garlic paste.

As well as diversifying into new products, he is also ensuring the longevity of the Witherslack orchards. Three sites have been identified where the orchards have been lost and they have been working to restore the landscape and increase biodiversity by planting around 250 new trees, including new varieties like Laxton's Fortune.

Witherslack Orchards products (Image: Sarah French) “We need contrast and a mix because they won’t all pollinate, and we don’t want them all coming ripe at the same time. It’d be good to be able to spread the harvest so we have early, mid and late season crops.

“We work in an environmentally sustainable way, rejecting the use of chemicals and pesticides and actively encouraging wildlife to increase biodiversity over the land. Our conservation graziers, Helen and Adam, graze their rare breed flock of Devon closewool sheep in the orchards. Grazing sensitively and keeping stock levels low helps us to produce a species rich grassland full of wildflowers and insect life.”

It is good for the environment, good for nature and good for apples.

Any retailer interested in selling Witherslack Orchards products can contact Sam at sam@witherslackorchards.co.uk

witherslackorchards.co.uk