Venosta Valley is the largest dry valley in the Alps, with less than 500mm of rainfall per year and being characterized by sunny days and cool winds at night. The altitude of the growing areas of up to 1100m provide to apples their excellent taste, due to the long ripening times.
It is ancient received wisdom that apples promote good health, and new positive properties have been discovered recently, such as the sun protection effect due to valuable carotenoids. There are
2000 local farming families who work in the apple orchards and produce more than
200,000 tons of apples every year.
In the area around Prato allo Stelvio/Prad am Stilfserjoch, there is mostly the cultivation of the typically
yellow Golden Delicious apple with its characteristic
red blush, although other apple varietals such as the Gala, Pinova, Fuji and Elstar are also grown there. In the old part of the village still find you
old Pala Pear trees on house corners and in front gards. The Pala Pear is unique and typical of the Venosta Valley, it is one of the true health makers among the fruits and was formerly prescribed by the doctor and pharmacy.
As the old adage has it: “an apple a day keeps the doctor away” and in fact, new healing properties deriving from the apple are still being discovered even today such as the sunscreen factor containing over 600 carotenoids.