Ditmars Orchard & Vineyard

Our take

What the record actually confirms

Ditmars Orchard & Vineyard sits at 19475 225th Street west of Council Bluffs in Pottawattamie County, and it’s a combined operation — a working apple orchard paired with a small vineyard, which sets it apart from most single-crop orchards in this research batch. The record, drawn from the orchard’s own website read September 2, 2026, confirms hours that stretch later than many family farms: Tuesday and Wednesday 10am-6pm, Thursday until 7pm, Friday and Saturday until 8pm, and Sunday 11am-5pm, with Monday closed. Phone is 712-256-7053.

U-pick apples are confirmed, but only one variety by name: Red Free, which the site’s own harvest tracker listed as currently ready as of the read date. Red Free is an early apple, one of the first to color up each fall, so its being called out in early September fits the normal ripening calendar. No other varieties, no season-start or season-end date, and no u-pick pricing were found on the site.

A working vineyard changes the visit

Most of the orchards researched for this batch are apples-only, so Ditmars pairing a vineyard with the orchard is worth noting on its own. The record confirms the site sells both apple cider and hard cider on premises — which suggests some of that vineyard fruit, or the cidery operation, factors into what’s for sale beyond the apples themselves. That said, the record stops short of describing a dedicated cider mill or a donut program the way several other Iowa orchards in this batch do; if a cider-donut stop is the point of the trip, this isn’t confirmed as that kind of destination.

The event calendar is the bigger draw here

What stands out most in the record is how much of Ditmars’ identity is built around recurring events rather than picking alone: a playground for kids, live music, movie nights, bingo nights, and a fall pumpkin festival are all confirmed activities. That’s a heavier events lineup than most orchards in this research pass, and it suggests Ditmars functions as much as a recurring local hangout as a one-time apple-picking stop. If a live-music evening or a movie night lines up with a visit, that’s a genuine reason to choose Ditmars over a quieter, picking-only farm — but the record doesn’t give specific event dates, so those would need to be confirmed separately from the orchard.

What’s still missing

The clearest gap is pricing: there’s no per-bag, per-pound, or admission figure anywhere in the record for u-pick apples. The variety list is also thin — Red Free is the only name that surfaces, and while it tells you something useful about timing (early fall), it says nothing about whether later-season varieties like Honeycrisp or Fuji are grown here at all. The record is explicit that this is a live tracker snapshot, not a season calendar, so a visit planned for mid-October shouldn’t assume Red Free (or anything else) is still available just because it was in early September.

Bottom line

Ditmars offers a genuinely different kind of visit than the typical apple-only farm — a vineyard on the property, cider and hard cider for sale, and a real events calendar with live music and movie nights. But the actual apple-picking specifics are thin: one confirmed variety, no season dates, and no posted pricing. This is a reasonable pick for someone drawn to the events and the vineyard angle, but anyone planning a trip purely around apple variety or budget should call 712-256-7053 or check ditmarsorchard.com’s live status before heading out.