Fruit growing has been undertaken in our area since the 1860’s gold rush began to slow and miners sought other means of making a living. Old mining claims were converted to orchard and lands were purchased from the then vast Earnscleugh station to plant fruit trees.
The Roberts family purchased what we now know as the Home Block in the beautiful Earnscleugh Valley of Central Otago in 1961 when Harry Snr was just thirteen years old. Leaving school at sixteen Harry bought into the Roberts and Sons Orchard business six months later.
In 1978 Harry and Joan took over ownership of the business from the rest of the Roberts family. Harry and Joan expanded the orchard by purchasing 230 hectares in 2001. This land is a blend of 25 hectares of workable orchard and the remainder is a beautiful schist hill country spur running off the Old Man mountain range.
A change of guard in October 2023 the orchard changed hands from H & J Roberts to Roberts Family Fruit Ltd, and is now owned and operated by Harry and Joans son Harry Jnr, and his wife Tasha. Harry Jnr is now the 4th generation in orcharding on his mother Joans (nee Hinton) side and 3rd generation on his fathers. The orchard has now grown from the original 12ha ‘Home Block’ to now 50+ha of orchard including a block Harry Jnr and Tasha added.
With at least five different soil types on the orchard, fruit and vegetables grow plentiful in this small corner of paradise, and there are always many new things in the trail phase - the orchard uses traditional growing methods and that has always suited them well.
The full stone and pip fruit orchard once exported most of its fruit, but nowadays it’s just cherries and occasionally apricots with the remainder going to local NZ markets. Roberts Family Fruit have a wide verity of cherries, apricots, peaches, nectarines, plums, apples and pears. The Roberts Family are renowned for having some of the coldest blocks in Earnscleugh.
The export market has increasingly strived for big, hard, crunchy cherries and Roberts Family Fruit Orchard prides itself on continuously building up its quality and reputation within the industry and for their buyers. Export markets overseas recognise and even request their distinctive box that their export fruit is packaged in.
The young couple are excited about the next generation of fruit growers coming through including Harry Jnr and Tasha’s four (now grown up) kids who’ve all worked on the orchard at various stages throughout their younger years, and still from time to time come home to work or even just help out.
We have a small core team of 15 full time staff that work all year round. From December to March we hire up to 100 casual contract workers to help with the harvesting in the orchard and packing and distribution in the packhouse. Additional staff come from Recognised Seasonal Employer (RSE) workers from Vanuatu, Working Holiday Visa (WHV) workers from overseas and local kiwi workers looking for summer holiday jobs.
Harry and Tasha also look forward to working alongside other growers, marketers and customers to connect and keep our industry thriving in the Central Otago district.
