Golden Malicious (Apple Orchard Mystery) (10 page)

“I’ll see if I can arrange it. See you tomorrow, Meg.”

“What’s up?” Bree asked.

“He says they’ve found more of the Asian longhorned beetles in Granford. I’m still not sure what that means, but it doesn’t sound good. Christopher’s going to show me the research labs at UMass. Although I’m not sure how much I really want to know about those insects—they are kind of big.”

“Nice to know you were right, isn’t it?”

“I guess, although I think I’d rather have been wrong. I’m going up to bed now—we’ll be busy in the morning, right?”

“Right. Unless and until it rains.”

The next day, the weather hadn’t changed. Meg had never thought she’d be tired of seeing blue sky, but then, she hadn’t been a farmer before. In this July’s persistent heat she found herself getting up earlier and earlier in the day simply because it was cooler then, and she could enjoy a cup of hot coffee and a light breakfast. Often she wandered out to visit with the goats—and more important, refill their water trough. Even they were less frisky these days, usually resting in the shade of their shed all day long.

Meg trudged silently up the hill to where Bree waited with the water tank attached behind the tractor, parked next to the spring house. She was almost afraid to look at the trees: would she recognize water stress if she saw it? To her inexperienced eye, there were fewer apples ripening than there had been the year before, but Bree had told her that that could happen with fruiting trees with or without drought. And setting fruit was unpredictable even under the best of circumstances. From her own reading she knew that in the early twentieth century Baldwins had been the orchard apple of choice, but they had one serious flaw: the trees bore only every other year. When the Hurricane of 1938 had severely damaged a lot of orchards, many farmers had opted to replace the Baldwins with more dependable Macintosh trees—with a sigh of relief, Meg surmised. It was, after all, a business, with no room for sentiment. You could count on Macintosh apples. Meg found them a bit boring, though, and enjoyed her few heirloom varieties, glad that they were gaining in popularity in regional farmer’s markets. It would be a real shame to let them all die out.

Standing next to the springhouse, or more accurately, houses—one older, where the spring had emerged naturally who knew how long ago, and one newer, which housed the pump and connecting equipment they were using—Meg turned to survey her domain. The Great Meadow looked deceptively green. It was still damp enough to encourage plants, but Meg knew that in a normal year, there would be standing water and it would more closely resemble a swamp, with abundant cattails. Already the air was hazy in the distance, even though the sun had barely cleared the tree line to the east.

“You ready?” Bree asked.

“I guess. How long do we have to keep doing this?”

“It depends on the weather, duh. In the long run, normally I’d test at intervals. There are lots of factors in determining how much water your orchard needs, including your soil type, the kind of tree, and whether it’s new or well-established. Then there’s how long and how much to irrigate. It’s a complex calculation, not just ‘water from eight to ten every day.’”

“Have I mentioned lately how glad I am to have you on board, Bree? Because I’ve still got an awful lot to learn.”

“You’re lucky to have me, and I’m lucky to have Christopher nearby for backup. Although he’s pretty busy these days, which is good for him and for the university, but he’s harder to pin down. What are you two doing this afternoon?”

“Are you jealous? I told you, he said he’d show me the insect research labs at the university, as a treat in return for my first sighting of this ALB creature. I’m not sure I relish the idea of spending time in a lab surrounded by large insects, but he thought he was doing me a favor, and I didn’t want to disappoint him. Besides, I can pump him for more information on irrigation.”

“That is a bad pun.”

“What? Oh, sorry. I will explore our irrigation options with him, okay?”

“Sure. I love free advice.”

Five hours later Meg and Bree had finished watering, but Meg was surprised when Bree headed the tractor back to the springhouse. She followed obediently. Bree attached one hose to the coupling—then turned the hose on her, drenching her.

“What was that about?” Meg demanded, laughing, when Bree cut off the water.

“I haven’t given you my hyperthermia lesson yet, and I want to make sure you remember.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Hyperthermia. Heatstroke. Heat stress, heat fatigue, heat exhaustion. Call it whatever you want, but when you’re working outside for hours in weather like this, you’re at risk.”

“Okay,” Meg said cautiously. “How would I know?”

“You stop sweating, for one thing. You may feel faint or dizzy. You could have cramps if you lose too much salt. Oh, and of course your temperature goes up—way up.”

Meg shook water out of her hair. “Thank you so much for telling me now. Why’d you wait so long?”

“Because it hasn’t been this hot for this long before. Anyway, it can creep up on you, so pay attention. Keep drinking water, and splash some on yourself. Or I’ll have to turn the hose on you again.”

“I bet you loved that,” Meg muttered. “Okay, okay, I’ll be careful. Right now I’m going to go get lunch.”

Meg went back to the house, while Bree returned the tractor to the barn. She found sandwich fixings—and remembered to rehydrate herself, now that she’d done it for her trees. One more thing learned. Heatstroke was not something one faced on the streets of Boston, and it never would have occurred to her. She checked her watch and finished her sandwich quickly. Despite Bree’s drenching, she still wanted to grab a real shower before heading to Amherst to meet Christopher.

On the ride to Amherst she reveled in the brief time spent in her air-conditioned car, and upon arrival, she felt lucky to find a parking space fairly close to Christopher’s office. Even so, she was dripping with sweat by the time she reached the building that housed his department.

When she presented herself at his door, he was quick to commiserate. “Ah, you poor child. You New Englanders are ill accustomed to this weather.”

“While you look ridiculously cool,” Meg retorted. “I hear good things about this newfangled air-conditioning stuff.”

“Your house is not air-conditioned?”

“It hadn’t been invented in 1760, and nobody’s bothered to update the place. It’s on my wish list, and I’ll probably get to it in maybe five years, assuming my apple trees survive this drought. I’ve got one cranky window unit in my bedroom, but I’ve got too much to do to spend time hiding out in that room just to keep cool. At least Bree’s room has cross-ventilation, which mine doesn’t.”

“Why don’t you sit and cool off for a few minutes before I take you down to the lab? You said there was something else you wanted to talk about?”

“Yes, there is. Can you tell me why, in all the years you managed the orchard for the university, you never installed an irrigation system?”

Christopher smiled. “Believe me, I thought about it. But it’s a rather convoluted history. There was an experimental orchard on this campus, years ago, but those in higher positions decided that they needed that land for a new dormitory. I argued that having full-time access to an orchard was important to our agriculture program here, and that was when the lease arrangement with your family came about, as a compromise solution.”

“I think you told me about that, when I first took over the place. And?”

“So we had our orchard, but since the university did not own the land, they declined to invest in any capital improvements, such as installing an irrigation system. Besides, I had plenty of free labor available from the ag students, so it did not seem as urgent as some other projects.”

“What about the spring and the pump there?”

“That, my dear, was the fruit of some creative bookkeeping—I think I labeled it something like ‘Supplies.’ It was the best I could do at the time.”

“Well, thank you for that, at least. Still, Bree and I are spending a whole lot of time and energy trying to keep the trees irrigated, and we’re exhausted. But I can’t afford to install a system this summer.”

“I truly sympathize. What about this: perhaps I can corral some students who are around this summer and ask them to help out? And I’m more than happy to assist you in planning for a system next year.”

“If my trees survive that long,” Meg muttered glumly. “I’m sorry, I don’t mean to sound ungrateful. You’ve been a terrific help. I’m just hot and tired and frustrated. Be honest with me: is this drought going to go on? Is this the new normal?”

“I wish I could tell you, Meg, but I’d have to be God. This is indeed an unusual weather pattern for this region. There are those who argue that this is one manifestation of global warming; others who claim that it is a normal if unfortunate variation from the norm, but all will be well—sometime. It makes little difference to you farmers, on a day-to-day basis.” He looked at her critically. “Are you ready to take the tour, or would you rather sit here a bit longer?”

“Door Number Two, please. Can you explain what’s going on with this beetle menace, before I go meet them up close?”

“Of course. How much do you know, so I won’t repeat myself?”

“I did some online research, so I know the basics, and Bree has filled me in. But the closest infestation has been in Worcester. I didn’t think this thing flew very far or fast, so what’s it doing here?”

“Worcester is perhaps fifty miles from here, as the crow flies, but I would agree that it didn’t fly here. As I may have already told you, usually the first insects are carried in, in packing crates or other wood products.”

“Bree said something like that.”

“I’m glad she’s been paying attention. Unfortunately, most infestations that have been found were well-established before they were noticed. The Worcester site was discovered after the pest had spread some ten miles in all directions, which meant it had begun years earlier. It originated in a packaging center, where many wooden crates passed through. I mention that only to say that the beetle could have arrived in Granford some time ago, but no one was looking for it, so it went undetected. We may never determine the source.”

“There aren’t people out there monitoring forests for pests like this?”

Christopher sighed. “Would that it were so. Unfortunately, there is the problem of chronic underfunding and understaffing in cases like this. Most of the insects, including the ones in Worcester, have been found by ordinary homeowners who happened to notice an unusual creature and made an effort to report it—which in itself requires some persistence. It is an imperfect system.”

Meg was beginning to feel more human now that she had cooled off. “This new sighting or whatever you call it, you said it’s confirmed?”

“It is, unfortunately. As soon as the first one was found, I sent it off to the appropriate government agency, and I followed suit with the second sample.”

“So what happens next?”

“There is a standardized procedure in place to address the issue of any discovery of an invasive species. When the insect is found, its identification must be confirmed by an approved authority, and that has been done. Then APHIS—the federal government’s Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service—will send out a team of inspectors, who will begin at ground zero, where the original insect was found, and examine trees at increasing distances from that spot. Not just looking at the trees from the ground, as you and I did, even with binoculars. They will have to actually climb the trees, or try to maneuver a cherry-picker truck in, to get a closer view. The inspectors will continue until they have established an area of at least a half a mile around the site in which no insects have been found. And then they will go in and cut down the infested trees, as well as all potential host trees within the perimeter they have established.”

“Ouch!” Meg said. “Is the landowner compensated for losing his trees?”

“Unfortunately not. They are deemed a public hazard. Moreover, the wood may not be used: the only proven method to eliminate the insect is to reduce the affected trees to chips and leave them where they were found. They cannot leave their point of origin.”

“I seem to remember reading that in Worcester, nearly thirty thousand trees had to be cut down and destroyed? This thing doesn’t attack apple trees, does it?”

Christopher smiled. “No, it is primarily a forest pest, although it attacks trees that might at one time have been found in a forest but that are now used as ornamental trees. In some suburban neighborhoods the effect has been devastating, at least in aesthetic terms.”

“Isn’t there any other way to attack them?”

“Not that we scientists have discovered—yet. That is why labs such as ours exist.”

“So tell me, what do you do in your lab?”

“We rear insects for research purposes. We make them available to other researchers across the country.”

“Can they escape?”

“We certainly hope not! You will see the precautions in place when you take the tour.”

“Are you the only lab doing this?”

“No, there are others, but all are carefully monitored.”

“I hope so,” Meg said fervently. “As Bree keeps telling me, we have more than enough pests to deal with already—and molds and blights and I don’t know what.”

“Ah, my dear, I never promised you that maintaining an orchard would be easy, did I?”

“No, I can’t say that you did. Blast Johnny Appleseed! He brainwashed us all into thinking it was simple: plant a tree and wait for it to grow up and produce apples.”

“Mr. Chapman did not have to concern himself with aesthetically pleasing apples, since his intention was always to turn them into cider and allow them to ferment.”