Last updated: April 7, 2023
Article
New Life for Old Orchards in Port Oneida
NPS / Andy Byerly
The orchards of Port Oneida Historic District in Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore are preserved and celebrated through annual workshops coordinated by NPS staff, partners, and community members. Originally starting with pruning instruction, the workshops now encompass the planting of grafted trees from a specially-created nursery.
The effort began more than 20 years ago when former Chief of Interpretation Neal Bullington initiated the mapping and identification of heirloom apple varieties in the park. To date, 75 varieties have been identified. More apple trees – some unidentifiable varieties – continue to be found, and Bullington is still involved as a volunteer. Kimberly Mann, Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore Historical Architect, and Matt Mohrman, Volunteer Coordinator at Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore, champion the NPS role in the collaborative orchard preservation effort. Tom Adams, an orchardist with the Leelanau Conservation District, and Jim Kelderhouse, Port Oneida descendant, have also been instrumental to its success.
NPS / Andy Byerly
NPS
Landscape Overview
The close-knit community of Port Oneida, located in northwest Michigan on the shore of Lake Michigan, began to develop in the early 1860s when European immigrants moved to the area, where the active port offered economic potential. After logging left much of the area cleared of trees, residents turned to farming as their primary source of income. Port Oneida existed as a subsistence level farming community from around 1900 until around 1945. Because agricultural development in the area largely ceased just after World War II, many features that date to the period of significance (1870-1945) are still present.
Today, the rural landscape is dotted with farms dating to the 1870s, marked by tree-lined properties, patches of remaining fields, small outbuildings like sheds and chicken coops, and plantings such as orchards. Now a historic vernacular landscape, Port Oneida Historic District is one of the most complete early 20th century agricultural landscapes in the Upper Midwest.
At least thirteen remnant orchards grow in Port Oneida. Orchards play an important role in defining landscape character and interpreting the agricultural history of the district. While some trees are beginning to show the effects of age and limited maintenance, many are still producing fruit, and the original geometric configuration of former orchards can sometimes still be discerned. The NPS has documented most of the varieties growing in the orchards. They represent important genetic material, since they contain some historic varieties that have been lost in the commercial fruit market and are increasingly rare worldwide.
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Pruning, Grafting, and Planting at Port Oneida
Early Efforts
The park hosted the first pruning workshop in 2006, in cooperation with the Leelanau Conservation District, the Michigan State University (MSU) Northwest Michigan Horticultural Station, and the County Extension Master Gardener Program.
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The first year of grafting was 2014. On a snowy March day, volunteers were provided a map of the orchards indicating their fruit varieties and rarity, and they ventured out on snowshoes to gather dormant cuttings of scion wood from the orchards.
The bags of scion wood, labeled and identified by GPS location, were taken to the MSU Northwest Michigan Horticultural Station and stored in plant refrigerators. Several weeks later, about 20 staff and community members attended a grafting workshop at the Horticultural Station. Participants learned how to prepare the cut-end of scion wood and the cut-end of an appropriate rootstock shoot to join in a graft union, producing a clone of the heirloom variety.
Taking Root at Kelderhouse Farm
None of the young trees lived after that first year of grafting, when had been planted on Leelanau Land Conservancy property and given limited care. In the second year, Jim Kelderhouse, a descendent of residents of the Kelderhouse Farm in Port Oneida and a local farmer, brought his expertise to the effort. A nursery was established at the farm in 2015, and more attention was focused on watering, mowing, pruning, and tending to the nursery stock. As a result of this care, the survival rate of young, grafted trees has jumped to 90 percent.
NPS / Andy Byerly
From Nursery to Orchard
The Port Oneida Historic Landscape Management Plan / Environmental Assessment was prepared in 2011. Using the plan, aerial photographs, and Jim Kelderhouse's memory of the farm orchard, the orchard was laid out on paper. After archeologists from the Midwest Archeological Center (MWAC) surveyed the area proposed for ground disturbance, the first 34 grafted trees from the nursery were planted in the Kelderhouse Orchard in 2019.
Several years later, the process was repeated for a second orchard re-planting in Port Oneida Historic District, this time the Dechow Orchard. In early May of 2022, after a chilly start to spring and a later-than-usual blossom time, workshop attendees and organizers gathered at Dechow for the annual workshop. Participants planted 32 apple trees that were about ten years old, representing varieties that had been collected from historic farms in the park and grafted onto appropriate rootstock in the nursery.
Ongoing Efforts
The park is now looking into agricultural wells and installing drip irrigation for the replanted orchards before planning more plantings in Port Oneida. Grafting continues each May as part of the annual pruning workshop, where participants repeat grafts for varieties that did not take in previous years. Technical instruction is provided by experts from the Leelanau Conservation District, the Michigan State University (MSU) Northwest Michigan Horticultural Station, and the County Extension Master Gardener Program. The workshop has been held every year since 2006 on the first Friday afternoon in May, open to the public and free of charge. Anywhere from 30 to 60 people are in attendance each year, weather dependent. All are welcome.
Alongside the NPS and partners, care for the fruit trees in Port Oneida has been a generational effort by many descendants who are still in the area, or who venture to Port Oneida for the workshop each May to help with maintaining the fruit legacy for the next generations.
NPS / Andy Byerly