Greek Food, Cooking and Recipe Community

Is it possible to grow olives outside of Greece?

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greek_ggirl

greek_ggirl

Active member
This is for all of the users that have a green thumb.... I've always wanted to grow olives in my backyard, but part of me thinks that they will never taste as good as the ones that I get from Greece. Is it even worth trying? For a little bit of context, I live in Montreal where the summers are warm but the winters are pretty cold and snowy. Has anyone tried this out themselves?
 
greek_ggirl said:
This is for all of the users that have a green thumb.... I've always wanted to grow olives in my backyard, but part of me thinks that they will never taste as good as the ones that I get from Greece. Is it even worth trying? For a little bit of context, I live in Montreal where the summers are warm but the winters are pretty cold and snowy. Has anyone tried this out themselves?
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I didn't think olives grew well in climates like that? They wouldn't survive the winter - but maybe if you had the tree indoors or in a greenhouse?
 
k_tsoukalas said:
I didn't think olives grew well in climates like that? They wouldn't survive the winter - but maybe if you had the tree indoors or in a greenhouse?
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I live in New Jersey and we leave our olive tree out starting in May until October. Then bring in to basement with grow lights. Get lots of olives. Good luck.
 
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Dluciani4 said:
I live in New Jersey and we leave our olive tree out starting in May until October. Then bring in to basement with grow lights. Get lots of olives. Good luck.
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Wow this is an amazing idea. Does it take a lot of work to keep the plants from dying when you bring them inside? I would love to get started on this project
 
greggd12 said:
Wow this is an amazing idea. Does it take a lot of work to keep the plants from dying when you bring them inside? I would love to get started on this project
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Not at all. We have it in a large pot and wheel it in. We have grow lights on a timer and maybe water it every 3-4 weeks during the winter.
 
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You’ll probably get decent fruit for a while, but long term mulberries want space. I keep mine smaller by pruning after fruiting, works better than trying to cage the roots. Funny thing, I got into indoor plants at the same time, and they’ve taught me a lot about controlling size with pots and pruning.
 
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