Day 9

Here's what I've learned so far:

Vegetables
- Grow basil next to tomatoes. The pests that eat tomatoes don't like basil.

Olives
- 'If you decide to start an olive grove, plant one varıety, not six.' -Shaman Farmer
- Olive oil at Yakabagh is made from 6 varieties of olives, which is the result of poor shaman economic decision making but produces a fabulously rich olive oil taste. Instead of intensely watering, thereby creating a plant dependency for frequent irrigation, he allows them to develop deeper roots to naturally extract water. Sinan does not use pesticides or chemicals. If he did, the trees could get more pollen to stick and produce more olives, but he claims this 'stresses' the trees out.
- There are natural alternatives to pesticides, like grape syrup traps that attract male insects so females can't mate. Sucks.
- Olives that get insect-ridden can still be used to produce olive oil, albeit at a lower grade. The protein from the insects and animal bacteria create higher acidity level, which lowers the quality.
- Olives that are good for eating and for making olive oil are very different. Edible ones usually have thinner skins and a higher ratio of flesh to pit.

Vineyard
- There are 40 distinct 'mother' grape roots. Depending on the kind of soil, the combination of limestone sand and mix of nutrients, there are certain mother roots that are more suitable for specific soil conditions. Next, considering the historic climate patterns, this narrows the suitable mother root to only 1 or 2. This mother root gets planted ınto the ground, and once established, the grape variety you wısh to plant gets grafted on top: shiraz, cabernet, etc. The grape vines grow rather delicately, and they have to be tended to gently, or else they'll break. Once they get tall enough, they are tied up in rows to ensure an even growth.