WELCOME TO QUALLA BERRY FARM
Berry Lovers: This will be a different kind of year at Qualla Berry Farm. We lost our 2011 fall crop of berries to a new pest, the Spotted Wing Drosophila.
We have pruned our raspberry canes to the ground over the winter and will get a single crop of primocane berries in late summer. Our hope is that the berries will ripen in the hotter weather when the fruit flies are dormant. The canes look healthy and we have our drip irrigation in place. We will keep you posted! Please add your name to our mailing list if you are not on it already and we will send updates. Thanks, John & Karen
Qualla Berry Farm is located at 3274 Qualla Road, Hayesville, North Carolina.
ABOUT QUALLA BERRY FARM
Our red raspberries are grown without chemical fertilizers or pesticides in double
dug French intensive style beds. They are a prolific locally adapted variety and
they bloom twice a year, bearing fruit in June and September.Our stock came from a
man in Hiawassee, Georgia who retrieved the plants from the woods and propagated
the berries years ago. He and the farm are gone now but a friend saved us the starts—
we began our raspberry patch with about a dozen plants in 1995 and now have
about 900 linear feet of 30" wide beds in raspberries. Our berries are pollinated by
our own honeybees and have done well in our well-drained bottomland soil.
Surrounding the raspberry rows on our farm are an organic vegetable and flower
garden, experimental fruit orchard in which Asian Pears have been our most
successful trees, a blueberry orchard, and a labyrinth surrounded by cherry trees.
We have honeybees which produce a wonderful sourwood honey.
ABOUT LOCAL FOOD:
Qualla Berry Farm is part of a loose community of growers and marketers throughout
western NC who are seeking to provide locally grown food to people who live and visit
the mountains. We are helping to develop ways to keep our rural land in agricultural production. We are listed in the Local Food Guide produced by the Appalachian Sustainable Agriculture Project. For more about U-Pick farms, tailgate markets, and community supported agriculture growers, see their website: www.buyappalachian.org
