Growing olives in the greenhouse

if you keep the trees as bonsai, will the fruit be the normal size and -if not- will they taste allright?

 

The fruit should be fine and of normal size. The olives on the top of the Arbequina in the photo are almost at normal size already.

 

So if I move Boris the Olive tree into the greenhouse I might actually, really get an olive off her this year????

Be the second time in about 30 years, which is about the same frequency that I got "olives" from the last mrs zigs

 

Today I relocated them to the deck to spend the summer outdoors. They will stay there until late November. They spend the winter indoors under lights in the basement, the early spring in the greenhouse; until I need it for tomatoes and cucumbers. The greenhouse has little to do with producing olives in my opinion. Some varieties, like Arbequina, are self fertile, others are not. If Boris flowers and does not produce olives Boris may need a pollinator.

 

She's only ever produced 2, the size of mouse testicles

 

Obviously Zigs there is something afoul with your growing conditions. It is only the beginning of May and here in frosty old New York my olives are going great guns. If you want to pack up Boris and FedEx her over here I will see if can get her to cooperate. Of course I would return her COD.

 

I don't see Zig buying a press for 3 1/2 olives...he will use a stone or a hammer!

 

Victoria seems to be the voice of doom, first she wrote I would not get a single olive, then: "Sorry, I have to laugh about you 'making olive oil' ... the presses are horrendously expensive making the cost of the olives a joke. Other friends of ours take their olives, of which they have many, many trees to a pressing plant (basically a small 'plant' attached to someone's home) and sell them the olives, which are pressed and in return they get 'xxx' number of bottles of their pure olive oil."
You can buy a press that attaches to a table and has a crank for about $125, also you can use a razor blade, a water and martini glass to get oil from olives. It just takes a little research. As for me, I would rather eat them than press them. Olives in the market are ten dollars a pound.

As a side note: One nice thing about growing olives in New York is that there is not a single insect that will bother them. They sit outdoors all summer and fall without any problems.