About Rusty Gate Olive Oil | ||
Hello, We are Don & Velvet Heater. We are the owners of a small olive grove on the Bellarine Peninsula in Curlewis, near Geelong, Victoria. We planted our olive trees in 2004, a couple of years before we retired, just to give Don something to keep himself occupied with. Don’s sister, Mary, has also been a key factor in the ongoing maintenance of the grove. Velvet maintains the Admin side of things. Of course, when it is time for the harvest everyone gets involved because we hand pick all of our fruit. We planted several varieties of olives, including Barnea, (from Israel), Frantoio (from Tuscany), Picholine (from France), Picual (from Spain), and Manzanillo (from Spain). It took 4 years for the olives to mature enough for oil production of any significance. Being situated on the northern side of the Bellarine Peninsula, with Port Philip Bay to the front of us and Bass Strait to the back, we are blessed with a Mediterranean climate, which enhances the production of superior quality oil. Add to this the excellent soil, abundant water, pruning regimen, and general grove maintenance, and you can see why our 2009 harvest produced 12 National Awards. Included are HIGHEST SCORING OIL in it’s class, GOLD MEDAL, several SILVER MEDALS, and multiple BRONZE MEDALS, as follows:
We have: * 3 water tanks * 2 dams * a bore * re-cycled septic system (we use recycled water on ornamental gardens, not on the olive trees) * and we also have town water. |
We are very lucky to have quite a bit of water, thanks to early planning. 