The great state of Texas was built by risk takers—those willing to step out in the vast unknown to do the impossible. The same can be said of the pioneer producers who have defied the odds— and conventional wisdom—to succeed at growing niche crops deemed implausible by skeptics. Jack Dougherty embarked on the road less traveled in January 1998, when he planted 800 olive trees on his Bella Vista Ranch near Wimberley. The very first year, he lost 550 trees when a blue norther swept across the region and the temperature dropped below freezing. That would have stopped some folks dead in their tracks, but the tenacious grower pressed on with his olive dream and replanted the trees. Today, Dougherty and his family are beginning to reap the fruits of a well-oiled, on-farm business.
"We produced our first olive crop in the fall of 2001," says Dougherty, a native Californian who fell in love with the Texas Hill Country during business trips to Austin a decade ago and made it his home. "This pioneering grove consists primarily of Mission and Coratina varieties, with the Barouni and Pendolino varieties planted for pollination. We are also testing Arbaquina, a popular Spanish variety, for its adaptability to the Hill Country environment."
Bella Vista Ranch is a diversified operation. Along with the olive orchard, Dougherty raises Red Brangus cattle and has a pick-your-own fruit and berry plot at the front of his 175-acre property.
With the acquisition of a high-tech commercial press, in August 2001, Dougherty established his frantoio (oil press) right on the ranch, where value-added, Texas Extra Virgin oil is pressed, milled and bottled under The First Texas Olive Oil Company label. The company also manufactures virgin soap, a pure Castile soap made from olive oil, which is sold, along with other jams and sauces created in the farm's certified food manufacturing facility, in an adjacent tasting room/retail shop and online.
"This is a working ranch," Dougherty says, "but it's an experimental station, too. We've proven that olives will grow in Texas. It's not easy, but it can be done."
History of Bella Vista
After 20 years in the computer industry, Jack and Pat Dougherty purchased what had been a goat ranch in Blanco County in early 1995.
At first, the Doughertys considered planting a vineyard at Bella Vista, but dismissed that idea because local liquor laws would have prevented them from selling wine at a winery. Then they began thinking about olives. Dougherty had become interested in growing olive trees while living in California in the 1980s.
"Olive trees are grown all over the world. But, they are predominately grown in Spain, Italy, Greece, the mid-East, North Africa and California. When we started ranching in the Hill Country, we realized that the soil and habitat were very similar to many areas of the Mediterranean, particularly parts of Spain and Italy. So we decided to give it a try," he recalls.
Dougherty laid out his property on the order of a typical farm in Italy.
"The family focus there is on fruit. There's either an orchard, a vineyard or an olive orchard on every farm. I reserved the front 20 acres for an orchard. With the olives, we have a touch of Tuscany in Texas," he says.
After the 1998 freeze that nipped his first planting, Dougherty concluded that once the olive trees were established, they could endure some lower temperatures, and would only be affected in terms of fruit production, like the local peach crop. That seems to have been true, as his olive trees appear to have survived a late February 2003 freeze.
"We really don't know the consequences of the last freeze. The leaves are still hanging. That's a good sign," says Dougherty.
Following a freeze, Dougherty paints cracks in the tree bark with a chemical similar to mercurochrome, to kill the bacteria around and in the cut.
"We are 1,100 miles south of Milan and 200 miles south of the Mediterranean. Texas' location is more like that of Tunisia, Algeria, Southern California. I track temperatures in 20 countries daily. It was 28 degrees in Milan, today (March 11). Most people think Italy is very hot, but it's not."
Dougherty says the first attempt at commercial olive production in Texas in 1982 failed, but he still believes there are a lot of favorable factors for growing the novelty fruit.
"First, the worse the soil, the better they do. Olives like a high pH, rocky soil, and we've got that," he notes.
According to the Texas Olive Oil Council, founded in 1994 to provide consumers and potential growers with information relative to the olive oil industry, olive trees don't like wet feet. The Council suggests the ideal texture for growing olive trees is a well-drained soil with no more than 20 percent clay, 40 percent limestone and 40 percent sand.
"Second, olives don't require much water—only a fourth as much as any other fruit tree," Dougherty points out.
Dougherty's well only pumps 52 gallons per minute. He uses drip irrigation in the orchard. He only supplements in late summer, right before harvest.
"Olive trees produce more fruit when under stress. Production of fruit is production of seed. If there are no threats, they won't produce fruit," he contends.
The trees are hardy and bug resistant.
"The oleic acid affects the leaves and makes the fruit bitter to everything but humans. Birds hate it. Bugs don't like it. I did have to put a deer-proof fence up because the trees are a hardwood and bucks love it. I lost 10 trees in one night to deer," he recalls.
According to Dougherty, olives' bloom time is April 5-15. Ideally, it will be a dry period with temperatures higher than 70 degrees, with a prevailing south wind to benefit from the pollinator trees, although a pollinator is not essential, he says.
"A seven- to eight-year-old tree will produce a half million white flowers that look like the Little Star Jasmine bloom. The tree will shed half of those. 85 degrees is ideal for the 52-day fruiting period," he says, noting that summertime temperatures are typically 70 degrees where olives are grown in California, and 75 to 100 in Italy. "Trees will grow to 40 feet, but with an orchard, we'll top them at 15, so we can pick the olives. Olives must be handpicked, which is the most expensive part of the process."
The Doughertys harvested 5,000 lbs. of olives in 2002, which yielded a little under 60 gallons of oil.
Curing and pressing process
An olive tree is a subtropical evergreen tree which will live and bear fruit for centuries.
"Historically, olives have been grown for 4,000 years. They are the first food stuff mentioned in the Bible, the first cultivated source. There were so many different uses for oil—light, heating and energy. Olive oil was important to the Greeks and valued for its healing properties. Also, olives were the basis for sacramental oil in Judaism and the Christian faith. The oil was used for santo, or "holy oil." That was the original purpose of making olive oil. When the Franciscans founded missions, they typically planted an olive orchard, a vineyard and a field of maize," he says. "In Europe, olive oil is sold directly from family farms that have been producing their special creation for generations. The oil is excellent quality, and each is unique. It's good for you and good-tasting."
Olive oil is a natural fruit juice, Dougherty says, and it needs a little aging, but actually has a limited shelf life. During farm tours and tastings at Bella Vista, Dougherty serves little shot-type cups of different oils.
"The protocol for tasting olive oils is just like wine," he says. "It is a fruit juice, a tasty treat. Sometimes it will have a nutty, grassy, or fruity aroma or flavor. It's different every year. The amount of water, picking time, age of tree and variety all affect the flavor."
Dougherty uses modern, Italian oil processing equipment (an Oliomio Mdl 60 olive oil press) that is especially designed to extract substantial volumes of the highest quality Extra Virgin oil by the "cold press" method. The first crop was pressed Sept. 24, 2001. The 2002 crop was pressed over a nonstop, four-day period last November, and is now available in the tasting room and online.
"We use a high speed centrifuge, the most ultra-modern method. It's completely integrated. It's essentially an Alpha level dairy machine," says Dougherty, explaining that it was invented by a dairyman and uses the same techniques to separate olive oil as those used to separate cream from milk. "Ours was the first in the U.S. We brought it in two weeks before 9/11. Now there are seven in the U.S.—five in California, one in Phoenix, Arizona, and the one here."
The olives are first treated with water. Then they go into a hopper, and travel on an auger to the hammermill, which crushes the olives into a paste that looks like guacamole. The oil begins to separate and is skimmed off. Paste goes through the centrifuge, which sorts out the oil and the paste goes out into a tank and through a composter.
"It's simple, but you must know how to operate the machine and temperatures," says Dougherty, who has a degree in chemistry. "We manage for the flavor we want and the chemistry we want."
Americans lead the world in consumption of olive oil, with 400,000 tons annually. Dougherty hopes to tap the gourmet market.
Is it a viable industry?
Texas A&M horticulturist Dr. George Ray McEachern is on record predicting that olives will never make it as a commercial crop in Texas. He says where olive trees grow well, they tend not to bear fruit because the nights are too warm. And where they bear fruit, the trees can freeze.
But Agriculture Commissioner Susan Combs has encouraged experimentation to see if olives will fit in Texas.
"The market is there, and producers should take a hard look at the viability of the industry," says Combs. "Growing olives is demanding work that requires knowledge of crop production and a sizeable investment of time and money, and the Texas Department of Agriculture is developing a manual that helps producers learn more about growing olive trees in Texas. TDA is committed to researching new ideas that help agricultural producers diversify_and keep rural Texas healthy and growing."
Statewide, there are about a dozen growers with 7,000 trees, many in a South Texas zone between Eagle Pass and the Hill Country. Olives are also growing south of Dilley, on David and Beverley Anderson's farm in LaSalle County.
Three areas in Texas believed to offer the best environment for growing olives are: just south of Austin on the Balcones Escarpment, in Dimmit County southeast of Eagle Pass, and between Uvalde and Del Rio.
Dougherty says it will take years to understand how well olive trees perform in Texas.
"It's a 50-year experiment of learning how to grow olives here. Once we learn the agricultural practices of growing the trees, then we can work on the varieties and oil," he says.
Bella Vista Ranch, is located at 3101 Mt. Sharp Rd., Wimberley. Visit the ranch's Web page at www.bvranch.com. For more information, call 512/847-6514; e-mail: bellavistaranch@wimberley-tx.com
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