The Winkelgut farm is in Colsano at the foot of Val Venosta's Monte Sole Mountain. There are dry stone walls in these orchards which are steeped in history, as they were built using the remains of the Via Claudia Augusta Roman road. Thomas always wanted to become a farmer. He went to the Laimburg technical college for fruit production, viticulture and horticulture in South Tyrol and took over the farm from his father in 1997. He is the third generation of his family to run the property. The hills around the Winkelgut farm now have flourishing, organic-certified Gala, Red Delicious, Braeburn, Golden Delicious and Fuji trees "and I am the biggest fan of each of these varieties". Thomas worked for a long time on converting the farm to organics. He has been optimising varietal selection for decades. "To do that," he reckons, "you need to put in a lot of thought and personal effort." That is the reason why his work is so engaging. For him it is particularly important to ensure that health aspects are at the centre of everything he does. "Organic production is very well suited to setting up a closed-cycle system." And this is what Thomas would like to safeguard.