Harvesting by hand is called ‘brucatura,’ and is slow, manual, and old fashioned work taking the olives from the tree by hand, with small manual rakes, and hand-held electric power extensions to reach the high upper branches. It’s based on traditional Italian harvesting methods which treats the trees with care and ensures that the olives are free of bruising and spoiling.

Canino olives at harvest are a small fruit, and tough little guys quite resistant to being taken from the branches, so it often takes persistant passing of the rake through the foilage and branches to tease them off the tree. Other olive types are plump and soft, and drop off the trees if you look at them at harvest time, but not Canino, oh no . We love this; you have to work for it, but the reward is fabulous.