All is not well amongst the olives

Have you seen the price of olive oil recently? It's not surprising, considering that all the health pundits sing the praises of this green-golden elixir. We all seem to want to cook with it nowadays, and dress our salads. But alas, recent olive harvests have been precarious, especially in Spain, and there have been shortages. No wonder prices are rocketing. So what is going on in St Etienne de Gourgas this year? How are the olive producers going to fare?

Just above our road into town lies an old olive grove. Planted on steep narrow terraces , the olive trees that grew there were some of the oldest in our valley, having survived the dreadful frosts of 1956 which killed off two thirds of all the olive trees in the South of France. They belonged to Monsieur B. the largest producer of olives in our valley, and every year they would be harvested by hand. It couldn't have been an easy job, as the road beneath them has since become quite busy, as opposed to the sleepy by-way it once was when the trees were planted. About a month ago we were puzzled to see that all the branches on these faithful old trees had been severely cut back. They remained little more than stumps. What was it all about?

What's more those beautiful old terraces looked devastated, as the earth was upturned and old stone walls that had taken months of copious labour to construct, all crumbled. The only trees that were left standing were those at the very edge of the road that would have cause rocks to collapse in the path of passing traffic. It was a sad sight. We were anxious to know what was going on. But Monsieur .B. is a busy man. We were never going to bump into him to pass the time of day, let alone find out the reason behind all this.

And then a mechanical digger moved in. The olive tree stumps were dug out and removed. It was a very sad sight.

Yesterday , on our way into town, we spotted Roland working in the small olive grove that he owns close to the Maison Forestiere. You will already know from earlier blogs, that it is from Roland that we buy the most delicious specially produced olive oil every year. We stopped to greet him , but he had a sad tale to tell. He had come to prune his precious oldest trees, the ones that produce the luques olive, a local speciality. He told us that there is a new threat to the olive this year in the form a disease called 'oeuil de pomme,' which he compared to the mildew that afflicts vines. He had to remove any early growth now, as it would fail to develop. He showed us his newly acquired electric secateurs of which he is exceedingly proud. You will see from the picture that he carries the battery in a body harness. "But," he warned us in all seriousness, "I have to watch that I don't lose any fingers." Apparently there are lots of accidents;

Roland had many olive trees to prune that morning. I hesitated to keep him, even though I should have liked to question him further about what was going on with his neighbour. But I needn't have been concerned. Roland always likes to chat, however busy he may be. "Have you seen what's happened to the olives above the road?" he asked us. At last , I thought, someone was going to 'fill us in.'

Thanks to Roland we learned that all the trees that had been removed earlier , had already been replanted in the valley alongside many of the younger olive trees that Monsieur B. has already. I suppose it should have been obvious. Old terraces like that have to be harvested by hand, and labour is expensive. Now that all his trees are together in one level place they can be harvested mechanically. Look closely at the accompanying photo and you will see them in their new situation. We were once told that 'you cannot kill an olive tree.' If we don't get any repeat devastating frosts, we should soon see those stumps(towards the top of the picture) burgeoning with new silvery green growth. Bon courage to our precious olive farmers!