1 Acre, 2,000 Trees, 0 Losses: Priors Grove Orchards Case Study

Intensive orchard production comes with predictable overheads, and one of the most predictable is tree loss. Priors Grove Orchards in Hereford reported a zero-loss outcome on a one-acre planting in 2018 after using Carbon Gold’s enriched biochar Tree Soil Improver as a planting aid.

Priors Grove is a leading organic top-fruit grower in Hereford that has been planting new trees every year for over 70 years. With the constant use of the site, Phytophthora and Pythium are recurring soil-borne pressures that cause losses among bare-root pear, apple, cherry and plum trees in most seasons. In the year following the 2018 planting, Priors Grove reported up to 20% fewer tree losses compared with the previous season.

In 2018, Priors Grove did not lose a single tree on the trial acre, despite the extreme UK summer conditions of that year. Trees were planted at 60 cm spacing and without irrigation. The grafted pear roots were planted with Carbon Gold enriched biochar at 1 kg per tree, alongside 300 g of biochar fertiliser.

Biochar is a stable, carbon-rich material that helps improve the water-holding capacity, nutrient retention, aeration and structure of soils and growing substrates. It also provides long-term habitat for beneficial soil microorganisms.

Carbon Gold’s Tree Soil Improver is enriched with Carbon Gold’s proprietary blend which includes mycorrhizal fungi. Customers have reported reduced transplant shock and improved drought tolerance, and there is supporting third-party research on biochar in establishment-stage tree planting (see substantiation note).

“The general principle of biochar is that it improves plant health, so we thought it worth trialling. And the fact that it is organic but still used by conventional growers, that was really intriguing.”

“We used it to plant our trees at the beginning of the 2018 season and the results were stunning, there is no other way to put it.”

Joe Pardoe, Priors Grove

In the seasons since, Priors Grove has continued to use enriched biochar and Biochar Fertiliser around the roots of new tree plantings on the site, with trees fruiting heavily.

“People will think we are mad because of the upfront investment, but it pays for itself many times over. We have never experienced 0% losses before. It’s a huge result.”

“In this game people don’t like to change, so it’s easy to get an edge by innovating. Enriched biochar is a no-brainer in terms of innovation. It’s ridiculous how well it works.”

Joe Pardoe, Priors Grove

Substantiation note

The outcomes described on this page are as reported by Priors Grove Orchards from its 2018 planting trial. Quantitative figures (zero losses on the trial acre; up to 20% fewer losses year-on-year) reflect Priors Grove’s reported experience, not a controlled scientific trial. Independent peer-reviewed research on biochar in tree establishment (Thomas and Gale, 2015, New Forests 46:931 to 946) supports positive growth responses across woody plant species with appropriate biochar specification. Carbon Gold does not currently publish product-level lifecycle assessments.