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2006 Olive Trees Flourishing

Welcome to the home of the first commercial olive orchard in Central Texas. We wanted to introduce olives to another "rich" part of the world…the Texas Hill Country.

Great Harvest in 2006

At Bella Vista Ranch, with more than 1000 olive trees in our orchard, we produced our first olive crop in the Fall of 2001. This pioneering grove consists primarily of Mission and Coratina varieties, with the Barouni and Pendolino varieties planted for pollination. We are also testing Arbequina, a popular Spanish variety for its adaptability to the Hill Country environment.

Hand Harvesting in 2006

Olives have been important to mankind throughout history and today the health benefits of olive oil are being universally accepted in the medical community. Olive trees are grown all over the world. But, they are predominately grown in Spain, Italy, Greece, the mid-East, North Africa and California. When we started ranching in the Hill Country, we realized that the soil and habitat were very similar many areas of the Mediterranean, particularly parts of Spain and Italy. So we gave it a try…

and we now have a Touch of Tuscany in Texas!

We invite you to visit the ranch to learn more about this truly unique-to-Texas crop. We provide tours of the orchard, the olive mill and offer tasting of fresh olive oil, gourmet foods and our hand-crafted wines -- please see the Events page for more details.

We harvest each fall in late September/early October and we are open to the public for tours of the harvest and pressing first hand. To receive an email alert for these events, please contact oliveguy@bvranch.com and let us know that you'd like notification of olive pressing events. 

For more information, please visit our Directions/Hours page, email oliveguy@bvranch.com or call 512-847-6514.