Joe’s father had raised sweet corn, often giving it to neighbors and selling a little. The love for and tradition of sweet corn carried through as Joe and Debbie first planted enough to sell a pickup truck load at the farmers market and it sold out in an hour. “For many summers, we would get the kids up bright and early to pick the corn, it’s best if picked that day, and would tell them we’d use the money to get away and do something fun like a day at Kings Island,” Debbie recalls. Sweet corn continues to be a summer staple for the Harkers, with staggered plantings aiming to provide fresh sweet corn from early July through September.
In addition to the fruit trees and sweet corn, the family works to plant their vegetable garden at the earliest time possible to provide fresh produce at the farm stand and farmers markets. The garden varies each year, but usually includes tomatoes, green beans, onions, zucchini, cucumbers, potatoes, eggplant, peppers, lettuce, asparagus, and broccoli. The farm is also home to a large strawberry patch as well as black raspberry, red raspberry, blackberry, gooseberry, and grape vines.
Variety is also found in the orchard, with trees being planted every year since 2009 and now more than 2,000 trees strong. Sixty percent of the trees in the orchard are peach trees, representing over 90 different varieties. There are over 60 varieties of apples, plus plum, cherry, nectarine, and apricot trees.
Son Brian works full time on the farm on the corn and soybean crops as well as helping out with the orchard, and the other children and their families come assist as they can, especially in the busy times. “In the height of the season we could have 20 different things needing picked,” Debbie says, an example being the overlap of apples and peaches, plums, berries, and nectarines all being ready to be picked at the same time.
One doesn’t often think of nectarines as an Indiana crop, yet Debbie says they grow as easily as peaches. “Nectarines are like a peach without the fuzz and you care for them in a similar way,” she says. Consumers can have a bad impression of nectarines they get at the store as those are typically picked green and never get soft and juicy. “We have converted people with ours which burst with flavor,” Debbie says.
Care and maintenance of the orchard is a year-round job, with pruning the trees over winter, and thinning the fruits on the trees in early summer to reduce strain on the branches and for optimal sized produce. The trees, which can live from 20 to 30 years, are sensitive to cold at the wrong time of year. “Freezing temperatures at the wrong time really hurts,” Debbie says. Dramatic temperature changes from fall to winter, significantly cold temperatures over winter, or a late spring freeze can all impact fruit production from the trees.
Continued education for maintaining the orchard is key to their success, and they attend the Great Lakes Fruit, Vegetable, and Farm Market Expo, networking with growers from all over the world and attending educational sessions. They also belong to the Midwest Apple Improvement Association and have been able to get new varieties of trees through this group’s breeding programs. “We like trying new varieties in the orchard and garden, and hearing from customers what they prefer,” Debbie says.
With raising so many varieties, it can be hard to pick a favorite, yet several rise to the top. “The Veteran peach is a good sweet yellow peach, and our customers also like our flat white “doughnut” peaches that have a seed in the middle that make the peach look like a doughnut,” Debbie says. Their “Bubble Gum” variety plums do taste like bubble gum. In apples, they have a new variety, “Ever Crisp,” a cross between Honeycrisp and Fuji, which as the name implies can stay crisp a very long time.
The Harker’s produce is sold from their on-farm stand, as well as several farmers markets where they have devoted customers. Educating consumers is an on-going process to help consumers recognize the seasonality and availability of locally grown produce. “I had someone come up and ask me why we didn’t have pineapples or oranges,” Debbie shares, noting that most farmers markets require items to be grown in Indiana.
The close proximity of where the fruit is grown to where it is sold allows the Harkers to hand-pick the fruit closer to its peak ripeness. In fact, the hand-picked aspect of their produce is one of the things that sets them apart from others. All of their produce from sweet corn to peaches and everything in between is hand-picked, mostly by family.
With numerous grandchildren as part of the family, the Harkers will continue to enjoy their family connection to the land, trees and crops. “Dinner table conversations focus on which variety of sweet corn at that meal is the best and should be planted again,” Debbie says.