In a greenhouse in central Japan, Daiki Kimpara grows some of the country's most prized melons, guided by one principle: one plant yields just one special fruit. But what does it take to grow something truly remarkable? 

Three flowers from one melon plant are chosen for pollination, but only the best one is allowed to grow. The others are taken away so the plant can focus its nutrients on one fruit. 

For Kimpara, a third-generation Crown Melon grower in Fukuroi, Shizuoka Prefecture, producing an exceptional melon begins long before that decision. 

While visitors admire the melons hanging from the vines, Kimpara focuses on the plants themselves, particularly their roots.

"No matter how hard you work later, you can't produce a good melon if you haven't properly developed the plant from the beginning," he told Spotlight Japan.

Such painstaking effort is on display at Nakagomi Noen orchard in Minami Alps, Yamanashi Prefecture, where a young woman carefully removes damaged berries from a cluster of Shine Muscat grapes.

For Kazumasa Nakagomi, producing exceptional peaches, grapes and other fruit is only part of the challenge. Turning them into a profitable business has also meant finding customers himself.

Each spring, workers at the ochard remove most of the buds from peach trees. Hand pollination and repeated thinning follow, until only a fraction remain as developing fruit, which are then wrapped in protective bags. 

The work demands experience. Nakagomi can bag about 1,000 peaches in an eight-hour day, but an 88-year-old worker who has helped at his orchard for three decades can manage twice that number.

 "Your body has to learn it," he said. 

Yet growing excellent fruit was only half the challenge. 

"One part is growing the fruit. The other is attracting customers. Those are the two wheels that keep the business moving," Nakagomi said.

As fruit prices weakened in the 1980s, he turned to apple-picking tourism in 1988. Business was initially slow.

One autumn, he noticed cars with license plates from outside Yamanashi heading toward the Southern Japanese Alps to see the fall foliage. He followed them to Yashajin Pass and found hundreds of cars parked there.

He bought plywood, made signs advertising apple picking and attached them to utility poles along the mountain road.

The following weekend, about 10 cars were waiting when he arrived to open the orchard. By day's end, he recalled, some 500 visitors had come.

But competitors soon began selling apples along the road. Nakagomi responded by distributing flyers at the mountain pass, later adding coupons offering a free apple.

The venture eventually expanded to other fruit. Today, his orchard also welcomes international guests for farm stays and seasonal fruit-picking through his English-language website.