Longacre Olives is situated in the smallholding area of Langebaan known as Longacres Country Estate. It is situated on the west coast of South Africa, 130km north of Cape Town. The smallholding was originally purchased for a very different reason originally. My horse - Maggia, see photo in photo album, contracted a severe hoof injury (infection caused by a suspected nail prick deep into the hoof) and I was advised that she would not recover from the injury, or at best would only ever be paddock sound for the rest of her life. I persevered with her and she finally recoverd completely and is now 100% sound. During the period of her recovery I was trying to come to terms with where I could retire her so she could spend her time doing what horses do. I looked arround and found the property advertised as Langemeer Equestrian Estate. During the period of purchase and transfer (about 7 months) she had recovered fully and is now 25years old (born 17-08-1988) and still looks like a filly. The olive estate was conceived through my need to now utilise the ground with hopefully a harvestable product that hypothetically required the minimum of maintenance and care (little did I know!). The first 400 Mission olive trees were purchased from Stargrow Nurseries in Citrusdal www.stargrow.co.za and planted in the spring of 2005. The planting was done in a 5x3m grid pattern north/south. The general area is well populated with a small buck species and every effort is made by the property owners to allow them free access to all parts, this unfortunatly led them to cultivating a liking for fresh new growth olive leaves. The trees suffered severe damaged by the buck and growth over the first 18 months was minimum. A fence was erected arround the 1 hectacre where the trees are planted and normal growth has been experienced since. In 2007 a further 600 Mission, 150 Frantoio and 120 Manzanilla tress were planted. The Frantoio were planted randomly between the existing trees to act as pollinators. Due to the very heavy southerly winds that blow during the summer months, the past 2 years, has led me to the conclusion that the best arrangement of planting was to hedge the tree planting. I made the decision to plant a tree between every existing tree, giving a 5x1.5m grid pattern, also given that the decision was made very early that the trees would be on a permanent dripper irrigation system.