DELTA water treatment makes lime family business grow

Lime tree orchardist Phil Oliver has just had his most financially successful year at his northern Queensland farm despite four consecutive dry years and only having access to the poorest quality bore water he’s ever seen.

He puts it down to the bore water treatment system of Australian company DELTAwater solutions which he installed in 2009.

Phil says that last year his 600-tree family business Phillisa Limes turned over seven times that of neighbours who had untreated water. This was despite ‘scraping the bottom of the barrel’ with salty water coming from bores that were nearly dry.

The kids have hardly had any summer holidays the yields are up so much, we’ve even had to get pickers in to help there’s so much fruit to pick. I blame Alex and Dianne from DELTAwater solutions, it’s their fault we have to work so much picking so much fruit!

Phil and Lisa Oliver in their lime orchard, Phillisa Limes, which is thriving since installing a DELTA in 2009.

Two of the Oliver children Shania, left, and Gabriel in their family’s Mareeba orchard. Big brother Tyrone also helps out.

At wit’s end

Phil says DELTAwater solutions has turned his business and his life around. When he first contacted the Newcastle-based company he was planning an exit strategy for his 600-tree Tahitian lime orchard at Biboohra, north of Mareeba.

He couldn’t see how he could continue farming due to his poor quality bore water. It was killing the lower branches where the sprinklers reached, eventually killing the whole tree. Yields had also slowed right down.

“I was at wits end. My trees were all dying off and not yielding very well and I was ready to sell out. I love farming but you can’t farm with rubbish water. I was just waiting for the wet season to make the trees look good again and was planning to put it on the market.”

Phil Oliver’s lime trees before and after DELTA treatment

DELTA saves business

He then came across DELTA’s bore water treatment products for salinity, calcium scale and iron problems and decided to invest in a unit as a last-ditch attempt to save his business. Within three weeks he saw a surge of life come through his struggling trees.

“I started seeing results with new shoots coming through the branches that were still alive around the base,” he says. “Within four weeks of watering, massive flowering started and it just hasn’t stopped.”

This picking season started in October and is still going strong as we move into February. They’re sending between 200 and 300 cartons a week to Brisbane, which equates to up to 36,000 limes.

“We’ve just about finished one section but we’ve got to restart on another section now because the trees are ready to go again. Week after week after week, we’re just picking crops.”

Wouldn’t be farming if not for DELTA

Phil says they wouldn’t be farming without the DELTA, which they have also installed on their household water supply.

“People call me and ask why I’ve got so many limes and I tell them we wouldn’t be here without the DELTA. I’ll never disconnect it, no way. I tell people they’re mad if they don’t put one on – since we put our DELTA on we’ve consistently had four times the amount of produce.”

DELTAwater’s 100% Australia products have more than 20 years of proven success delivering water treatment technology solutions for a range of water problems including salinity, iron and scale. The company’s products are chemical, maintenance and power free.

Because it works

I’m very happy. People need to know there’s something out there that will give them results with their water problems, whether it’s in the house, in the garden or for farmers like me. If I had time I’d go out and sell DELTAs to people but I have too much work on here! I’m definitely recommending DELTA bore water treatment because it works.