EAGLE BRAND PISTACHIO GROVE

HAPPY THANKSGIVING !!

And we hope you had a wonderful one!!

Just before Thanksgiving Gary and I went to

Eagle Ranch Home of Pistachios, Heart of the Desert just about a quarter mile from our RV Park. We stopped to take the tour of their plant.

Carolyn was our tour guide who has worked for them for six months now. She said that she practiced her monologue by sitting her three chiuauas up in a row to listen to her practice!! Do you suppose that they sat still??

We began the tour in the orchard where she explained that this farm began with just four hundred trees and is now eighteen thousand!! The owners were nearing retirement from the military here in NM and trying to decide what he would do next. He grew up on a farm in Nebraska and was still interested in agriculture, but they wanted to re-main located here in NM after retirement. So his wife and children did a lot of research to see what agricultural products would be best grown here. Thus they came up with pistachios!!

Pollination requires that there would need to be one male tree to every eight female trees. You can tell by the size which are male. The nuts grow in clusters and are removed by shaking the trees. This next picture is an actual cluster on the trees as they appear at this time of year.

The nuts are put on trays and roasted in the ovens twice before any seasonings are added.

When a flavor is added they are then roasted again.

They are stored in controlled temperature warehouses until they are all toasted and packaged.

They also have a 48 degree room where finished, packaged products are stored awaiting sale and shipping. They ship their products all over the world. Maybe you have seen their name out there.

Their engineer son designed this first separator that they used.

These two pictures are separators used later where nuts are sorted by size, and any foreign objects are removed that the employees miss when sorting by hand.

This round drum separates the open shelled nuts from the closed nuts and has pins along the inside to grab the open nuts while the closed ones fall to the bottom and are sent to bins. There were two girls weighing each package to then send them on to bagging in decorative packaging for the specific buyers or plastic bags for store shelves.

Several years ago their grandson, then 4 years of age, posed for their advertising. This has definitely been a family business.

At the end of our tour we just happened to be in the right place at the right time to meet the owners. The employees were joining them in the customer service area to celebrate a special birthday.

This was the birthday lady and we got to be in on the singing as we were in the room placing an order.

We then returned to exit through the gift shop. Many gifts could be bought there in addition to the nuts, candy and pistachio wine. There was a wine tasting counter also.

Our only problem with most gift shops is that most of the items are from China, rather than locally made. Here in the south west that should not be so, as there are still Indian and southwest crafts being made.

On several occasions we have spent time with Gary's cousins in their home. They have so many stories to tell of the southwest, especially NM. This has helped us determine what to go out to see.

Then Gary and Mildred have also spent some interesting time on family history and photographs. This is a passion for both of them. On Thanksgiving we took Mildred and Zollie through the San Andres Mountains to Las Cruces for Thanksgiving dinner. We passed the Organ mountains on the south side of the highway(called that because of their distinctive shape). They are very picturesque and have been painted by Don, a friend of theirs. We got to meet Don and Pat at dinner also.

Mildred and Zollie's daughter and son-in-law, Barbara and Jim very graciously invited us to share Thanksgiving dinner with them. It was fun to meet this extended family and their friends, Don, Pat, Michael and Jenny and their children. There were many interesting stories shared. They are all very interesting!!

The boys came back after their scavenger hunts in the desert, so I was able to get their picture. But I missed getting a picture of Emily and her friend. Next time!!

Thank you very much Barbara and Jim!!

Stay tuned!