The Orchards Of Doncaster And Templestowe - 9 The End Of An Era

During the 1939-45 War, food rationing and manpower changed the life of the district. The Apple and Pear Marketing Board took over control of cool stores and the sale of all apples and pears. Young men joined up and women who could be spared became nurses or worked in essential jobs. Labour for work on the land was scarce. Many women such as Kathleen Petty and Peg Chivers did all the work on the family orchards. University students, teacher trainees, and land army girls picked fruit. Fruitgrowers welcomed the end of the Apple and Pear Board. The low prices paid by the board gave little profit. A grower would receive only a small percentage of the market price, perhaps four shillings for a case that sold for twelve shillings at the market.

In 1947 the Eastern Metropolitan Fruit Growers Association was formed. There had been many associations of fruit growers since the Doncaster Fruit Growers Association was formed fifty years previously. Growers had been split by a breakaway political group, but the new association brought the growers together again.

Orchardists were accustomed to disaster. Pests, drought, and hail were constant threats, but in 1937, they were not prepared when fire destroyed the east building and refrigeration plant at the Orchardists Cool Store in East Doncaster.

The pear-picking season was at its peak; 50,000 cases, mostly uninsured, were destroyed and the western building was packed to capacity, with no cooling facility in operation. Technicians from Werners and Michell & Co. worked continuously for 36 hours to install a temporary operating plant. Eleven years later another fire damaged the building. When the store was re-built in 1948, its capacity was increased to 140,000 cases.

Gradually tractors had taken the place of horses on the orchards and blacksmiths closed down. Blacksmiths shops were called the ‘service stations’ of the past, for they provided an equivalent service for horse- drawn vehicles as petrol stations did for cars. In some instances, a service station was later established on the site of a blacksmith’s shop. At Templestowe, there was a service station on Calder’s site at the corner of Foote Street and Thompsons Road and another opposite Mullens corner. Along Doncaster Road, at the corner of High Street, a service station occupied part of Smedley’s land, another on Hillmans site at Wetherby Road and on Kent’s corner at Blackburn Road.

The disappearance of horses brought about another problem. There was no longer a ready supply of stable manure for the orchards. The fertility and tilth of the soil tended to decline with continuous cultivation. Previously, large quantities of horse manure ploughed into the ground had made Doncaster and Templestowe the leading fruit growing district in the State. Improved artificial manures, which became available after the war, increased yields, especially when humus material, such as wool waste was added to the soil, but these organic materials took time to collect. Labour costs were high, so many growers relied on processed fertilisers, which exhausted the soil of organic material.

Irrigation improved during the 1950’s. Easy coupling aluminium pipes were lighter to move around the orchard and by using sprinklers on pears and apples, the additional water enhanced the size of the fruit.

DP0837 Orchards at Donvale |1950s  Aerial photograph of part of Donvale during the 1950s.

When pruning trees, workers used stepladders to reach high branches but rear supporting legs were obstructed by branches. An improvement was a ladder with only one rear prop enabling pruners to get closer into the centre of the tree. In the years after the war the same concept, made of steel had the front legs wider to provide more stability. Some men found the steps on a steel ladder harder to stand on for a full day’s work and many continued to use the old wooden ladders. Labour costs became a serious problem, so to reduce the time-consuming job of pruning, growers cut less from the trees and in some years left apples unpruned. Branches grew higher and hung down, making picking easier. Thinning sprays on young fruit avoided the need for hand thinning and the same chemical used before harvest acted as a cling spray, holding ripe fruit on the tree until picked. New equipment saved labour. The Ferguson tractor, with its hydraulically operated draw bar, did the work of previous equipment faster, and only required one operator.

DP0486 Picking fruit at Wonga Park A boy picking fruit at Wonga Park, using a step ladder. Fruit growing was the main industry on the small holdings in the "Village Settlement" of Wonga Park. 

After Jack Russell produced his ‘Bave-U’ motorised spray pump, many other makes were also used on orchards, such as Merriman, Tom Thumb, Fuller and Johnson and Ronaldson Tippet. These units were first drawn by horses. When orchardists started using tractors, more powerful spray machines were developed. These machines travelled slowly down the orchard rows sending out a penetrating blast of spray, which enveloped the trees saturating them in a mist of spray. Trees were then planted closer together so that spray would not be wasted on the empty spaces between trees.

A new generation of insecticides and fungicides assisted orchardists in the years after World War II. D.D.T. came first and killed codlin moth on apples and Rutherglen bug on peaches. Mercuriated lead replaced D.D.T., but had a tendency to burn the fruit. Organic sprays such as Gusathion and Dithane gave excellent results but care had to be taken when using these chemicals owing to their toxicity.

Fruit agents now ordered directly from the orchard. The grower filled orders and knew that his load of fruit was sold before he left home. This method opened up a new line of business for some local fruit growers when their orchards ceased operation. They built cool stores in Doncaster and went into the business of buying, packing, and selling fruit. For longer storage life, they installed controlled atmospheric equipment by which the oxygen level in chambers was reduced. Increased levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere delayed the natural deterioration of the fruit.

In the 1960’s cool stores closed down. The old buildings, with their wooden floors were designed for hand trolleys and fruit cases. Modern methods of industrial handling with forklift trucks and bulk containers required a different approach. Orchardists now built their own cool stores with concrete floors and facilities, for bulk handling. In past years, every case of fruit was handled many times. In the orchard, a fruit picker lifted full cases from alongside the trees and stacked them in the shade of pine trees. Later, he lifted them onto a jingle and in the shed, they were unloaded onto a cool store trolley then lifted up onto a stack in the cold chamber. This was labour intensive and hard work. With bulk handling, large bins were never touched by hand; forklifts did all the work.

Many of the orchards had already gone when these modern methods came into practice. A few orchardists tried sod cultivation, but in the shallow soil of Doncaster, they found this only worked with plenty of water. By the time drip irrigation came into use, only a few orchards were left in the east of the district.

In the years after World War II, the population of Melbourne increased rapidly. Doncaster and Templestowe became a desirable area in the rush for more housing land. From 1950 to 1960, the population increased threefold from 5000 to 15,000. The value of land rose accordingly and, as services had to be provided for the new suburban population, rates also increased. Orchardists sold their land to developers and either retired from fruit growing or moved to other areas further out such as the Mornington Peninsula, the closer areas of Gippsland, or the Goulburn Valley.

Orchards to the west went first. Bulldozers pushed over trees, houses, and sheds were demolished, and dams filled in. During the 1950’s, Doncaster changed from an orchard district to a new suburb and sub divisions rapidly continued to the east. Doncaster and Templestowe became the fastest urban growing area in the 1960’s. From 1960 to 1970, the population grew from 15,000 to 64,000 and orchards were reduced to 2,000 acres (810 hectares).

Only street names remained as a reminder of the resourceful men who planted fruit trees in Doncaster and Templestowe and laid the foundations of an orchard empire. Doncaster and Templestowe and the fruit industry owes a great debt to those dedicated men.

Source: The Orchards Of Doncaster And Templestowe By Irvine Green Published By Doncaster-Templestowe Historical Society 1985 - Original Scan.