For truffle growers & orchard owners
Your truffière, and everything it needs
Harvesting teams, dog selection and sourcing, orchard workshops and advisory — from the people who have been working cultivated truffle ground in North America for nearly twenty years.
Truffière services
Growing truffles is agriculture. Getting them out of the ground is a different skill.
A truffière can be planted perfectly, inoculated well and managed carefully, and still leave most of a season’s fruit in the soil. Truffles ripen underground on their own schedule, with no visible sign at the surface, and the only reliable way to find them at the right moment is a trained dog and a handler who knows how to read one.
Truffle Dog Company has worked with cultivated orchards across North America since 2013 — surveying ground before it has produced, harvesting established truffières through full seasons, helping growers select and train their own dogs, and advising not only on how to efficiently get the crop out, but on what’s next. Whether you want a team on your farm this season or a dog of your own working the rows for the next decade, this is where you start.
- Who we work with
- Commercial growers & new orchards
- Services
- Harvest, surveys, dogs, advisory
- Experience
- Nearly 20 years on truffle ground
- Coverage
- West Coast, East Coast & partner teams
- Booking
- Seasonal — inquire early
- Contact
- info@truffledogcompany.com
Where to start
Four ways we work with growers.
These aren’t steps in a sequence. Most farms use several of them, in whatever combination suits the operation — a veteran team harvesting the orchard, a dog of your own coming up alongside them, advisory running through the whole thing. Take what’s right for you.
Most common
Harvesting & surveys
Veteran truffle dogs and experienced handlers to survey your ground or harvest your truffière through the season. The fastest way to find out what your orchard is actually producing.
Harvesting services →For your own program
Truffle dogs
Selection, temperament testing and sourcing — puppies, started dogs and trained dogs — matched to your ground, your team and your household.
Truffle dogs →In person
Growing workshops
Orchard management workshops held on working truffières, covering establishment, maintenance and harvest practice with growers who do it every season.
See workshops →Ongoing
Orchard advisory & coaching
Consulting on orchard management, production, harvest planning and the business side — including agritourism and getting your crop to market.
Advisory & coaching →Wild ground rather than a planted orchard?
If you own forest, a tree farm or a pecan operation and want to know whether native truffles are growing on it, that’s a different service — see wild truffle surveys and harvesting.
By stage of your orchard
What’s useful depends on where you are.
Before the trees go in
The decisions made now determine how harvestable the orchard is in ten years — spacing, layout, species, and whether a dog and handler can actually work the rows you’re about to plant.
- Advisory on establishment, layout and species selection
- Orchard management workshops on working farms
- Early conversations about what your harvest plan will eventually look like
Waiting for the first truffle
The hardest stretch. Trees are in, brûlés may be forming, and there’s no way to know from the surface whether anything is happening underground.
- Survey work to confirm whether your orchard has started producing
- Dog selection, so your own dog is trained and ready when the crop arrives
- Advisory on what to expect and when to expect it
Harvesting the crop
Ripeness windows are short and truffles left too long are lost. This is where consistent, well-timed dog work turns a producing orchard into a profitable one.
- Harvest passes through the season, scheduled around ripeness
- In-house dog and handler development so your team can cover the season
- Post-harvest handling, storage and market advisory
- Agritourism and culinary programs built on a producing farm
Where we work
Teams on both coasts, and a network beyond them.
We have teams operating on the West Coast, the East Coast, Texas and the South, and can connect growers in other regions with vetted handlers from our advanced student and instructor network. Our experienced teams have located and harvested cultivated truffles on truffières in:
We also work with growers internationally, including in Australia, France and the UK. If you’re outside these areas, get in touch anyway — we’ll tell you what we can do from here, or point you toward someone closer who can help.
Why growers work with us
We built this side of the industry.
Orchard dogs, not just wild hunters
Our dogs are trained specifically for truffière work. Veteran teams know the orchard environment, work methodically through planted rows, and alert precisely — finding ripe fruit without damaging the truffle, the brûlé or the root system.
We helped build the practice
TDC was the first to locate cultivated Périgord truffles in Canada, and our teams have worked cultivated ground across the continent since 2013. Much of the orchard harvesting practice now standard in North America was worked out on truffières with our dogs on them.
The whole picture
Harvest is one piece. We advise on establishment, management, post-harvest handling, market access and agritourism, because a truffière is a business and the truffles are only half of it.
We train the next teams too
The same organization that harvests your orchard teaches the classes your own handler will take. If you want to bring the work in-house eventually, the path is already built.
Get in touch
Tell us about your truffière.
Acreage, species, when it was planted, and what you’re hoping to get done this season. We’ll tell you what makes sense — including when the answer is to wait.
Contact us Or email info@truffledogcompany.com. Harvesting is booked seasonally, so earlier is better.Questions
Frequently asked
My orchard has never produced. Is it worth a survey?
Often yes, and it’s the most common reason growers call us. A survey tells you whether anything is fruiting underground, which is information you cannot get any other way and which changes what you do next.
How old does a truffière need to be?
Production timelines vary widely with species, site and management. Many orchards see first truffles somewhere between years four and eight, and plenty run later. Tell us your planting date and species and we’ll give you a realistic read.
Should we hire a team or get our own dog?
Both are good answers. Hiring gets truffles out of the ground this season with no training curve; your own dog pays off over a decade and gives you coverage whenever you want it. Many growers start with a team and add a dog once they know what the orchard is doing. See truffle dogs.
What does it cost?
It depends on the size of your orchard, where you are, how many passes you need and the time of year. Get in touch with those details and we’ll put a number in front of you.
When should we book?
As early as you can. Harvesting is booked seasonally and teams travel, so the calendar fills well before the ripeness window opens. That said, we may already be heading to your area — reach out with your request either way.
Do you help with what happens after harvest?
Yes — handling, storage, market access, and building culinary or agritourism programs on a producing farm. That’s what the advisory work covers.
We’re not in North America. Can you help?
Sometimes directly and often through our network. We work with growers internationally, all over the world — including Australia, New Zealand, the UK, France, Spain and more. Write to us with where you are and what you need.
