WELCOME TO Fall

Labour Day and the end of summer vacations everywhere are looming just a few days away, but the vibrant summer vibes have been going as strong as ever here on Salt Spring. On Saturdays, the market and downtown Ganges are still thronged with tourists and locals alike; the marinas are still full of boats from near and far, and the cidery’s patio and picnic area still have plenty of visitors soaking up some sun and cider. Summer always seems to finish with a bang on the island as people cram in their last getaways before school starts and the rains come, and this year is no exception.

After Labour Day, the island slows to a much more sedate pace. The Fall Fair and the Apple Fest are the last two big events before Salt Spring really starts to quiet down and get cozy. But just as we’d like to catch our breath from keeping up with the demands of summer, we have to pivot to another big job: harvesting and pressing apples and pears from here on the island. Even though it’s hard work, the harvest and press are central to our identity. The cidery started primarily as a gleaning operation, making use of the island’s unique heritage apple and pear trees. While in earlier times these trees were central to the agricultural economy of Salt Spring, in more recent decades they’d become under-utilized, if not forgotten altogether. The ‘wild’ in Salt Spring Wild Cider was originally a reference to these wild, or at least feral, fruit trees, which were given new purpose and appreciation through our cider making. Even as we’ve outgrown sourcing our fruit entirely from Salt Spring, the island’s apples and pears still form the backbone of our traditional ciders and are what give them such fantastic character. We collect fruit from the humble backyard trees of friends and neighbours as well as from larger orchards, and it’s beautiful to have both the island’s apple terroir and its human community represented by our cider. Here’s to a bountiful harvest!

We have some wonderful ciders in this shipment. We’ve included our latest batch of Farmhouse Scrumpy as a cider that pays homage to the apple harvest. For those unfamiliar with the term, a scrumpy is a style of cider that developed in the West Country of England, one of the most storied cider regions in the world. It comes from the slang term ‘to scrump,’ which means to scavenge or steal, in this case referring to whatever apples were unclaimed at the end of the harvest. A scrumpy tends to be bolder in flavour, higher in alcohol, and funkier and less refined in general. True to this tradition, our Farmhouse Scrumpy has an array of heritage apples and a sizeable selection of bittersharps. It’s also a wild ferment, with some noticeable character from the yeast, and it weighs in at just shy of 8% ABV, which also adds to its rustic, rough-around-the-edges charm.

We’re also continuing our explorations of naturally carbonated ciders, as well as our blends of cider with grapes. Our Bottle-conditioned Muscat does both, as the name suggests. This cider is a co-ferment of apples and Muscat grapes, and it’s carbonated by bottle-conditioning, or letting a final fermentation occur in a sealed bottle to infuse the cider with CO2. This creates a softer, champagne-like effervescence. It’s full-bodied for a cider with a subtle Muscat sweetness and a gently spicy finish.

And, we have another look at our Orchard Run Pét Nat made from our 2025 harvest. As the little orchard we’ve planted here at the cidery continues to grow and mature, we’ve begun making an annual estate cider from its apples. Most of the Salt Spring apples that go into our ciders come from farms and trees all around the island, since we do a lot of gleaning of unique old trees that are part of Salt Spring's rich apple producing history. We find some really fun, funky, and unique heritage cider apples as a result, but it’s sometimes still a matter or chance as to what exactly we get from our neighbours. Our own orchard is something we have been able to curate more tightly, selecting some of our favourite apple varieties for cider making. These include Yarlington Mill, Orange Cox Pippin, Calville Blanc, Northern Spy, Golden Russet, Porter's Perfection, Chisel Jersey, and Foxwhelp. Since the plan is to make this an annual release, it's an invitation to taste how the cider from this little micro-terroir changes and develops with each year. We included a bottle in the March shipment when it was still quite young and a bit green, and now you have a chance to see how the cider has mellowed and matured after an additional half a year of ageing.

As usual, the other three ciders are up to you to pick, so please follow the link below to make your selections.

Best wishes for a beautiful autumn! As always, thanks for your continued patronage. Cheers!