Cherry harvest will be average, late

It’s shaping up to be an average but later-than-normal cherry harvest in the Flathead Valley, several cherry growers said this week.

Dale Nelson, president of the Flathead Lake Cherry Growers, said the 2011 harvest could be the latest ever.

“Probably no one will pick until July 28,” Nelson said. “And we expect most people to pick through mid-August.”

Some years, the local cherry harvest has begun in early July, but normally the cherries are ripe in mid-July, Nelson said.

The cherry growers’ cooperative owns a warehouse at Finley Point, which Nelson said should open this year on July 27 or 28.

Overall, the crop weight appears to be a little below average, Nelson said. He expects local growers to harvest about 2 million pounds of cherries.

An average crop here is 2.5 million pounds. Last year’s harvest was excellent, and growers delivered 2.75 million pounds of cherries to the processing plant, he said.

Cherries are ripening later this year because of the cool spring and early summer temperatures in the valley, Nelson and other growers said.

But a late harvest this year isn’t particularly bad news for valley growers, Nelson said, because the Washington cherry crop is late.

Timing is everything in the cherry business, Nelson and grower Louise Swanberg said. Flathead growers want their fruit to hit the market after the Washington cherries are sold out. Being the lone player in the game later in the summer tends to drive prices up, Nelson said.

“When the Washington crop hits the market, prices drop a little,” Swanberg said.

But it appears the timing of harvests this year bodes well for Montana growers, she said.

“We always want the demand to exceed the supply,” Swanberg said. “So even if we don’t have a boomer crop, we will have the price we need to stay in business.”

Grower Gary Hoover says the annual drop in his orchard didn’t occur until July, several weeks later than it happens most years.

Fruit drops off of trees when a tree “can’t hold that much fruit,” Hoover said. He estimated his trees dropped about 50 percent of their fruit.

The drop is important in helping cherries grow larger, Hoover said.

“Size is everything,” he said. “Without the drop, you have too many cherries on a tree and the fruit is too small.”

Hoover expects a medium crop this year at his Orchard Estates on Montana 35 near Bigfork.

He doesn’t expect to begin picking until the first week of August. His 180 trees are lapins and Rainiers.

Hoover and his wife, Susan, plan to set up their Gary’s Cherries roadside stand this year. The Hoovers don’t always sell from a roadside stand but had good success last year, so they decided to set up a stand again this year.

Cody Herring, owner of Glacier Fresh Orchards and Packing at Yellow Bay, said this year’s harvest will be the latest in his 10 years in the industry.

“We’re really late this year,” he said. “It will be after Aug. 1 before we start picking.”

Herring has 35 acres of trees and grows Rainiers, lapins, sweethearts and Kootenai cherries.

In addition to packing his own fruit, he packs cherries for other growers and ships the fruit overseas to niche markets he’s developed in Asia and Europe. Herring is an independent grower.

Cherries delivered to the Finley Point warehouse owned by the cooperative are shipped on refrigerated trucks to Selah, Wash., for processing.

Swanberg says this year’s 10- to 12-day delay in the start of harvest will contribute to 2011 likely being considered a variable crop.

“My particular set is average,” she said.

But some growers are reporting a light crop, she said.

Like other growers, Swanberg still welcomes rain this week, “but if it rains in two weeks, we’re in trouble,” she said.

Swanberg plans to keep The Cherry House open until about Aug. 20, selling fruit from her roadside business on the west shore.

Swanberg is participating in the ongoing cherry trials project, in which several growers have allowed test plots to be planted at their orchards.

The trials project will allow growers to determine if there are more suitable cherry varieties to plant in the Flathead that could extend the local cherry season. As the Washington harvest continues to extend into Montana’s season, it’s important to find a later cherry, Swanberg said.

The whole cherry industry is based on “having a cascade of cherries going through,” she said.

“We want to find a variety that has all the attributes that we have here, able to handle a long winter and produce big, firm cherries and not split in the rain.”

“The varieties trial trees are looking fantastic,” she said. “They are growing beautifully.”

Some of the test trees at her orchard produced fruit this summer, but she picked the fruit off to allow the trees’ root systems to develop.

“It’s important to let a tree get its roots established for four or five years before it focuses on fruit,” Swanberg said.

Reporter Shelley Ridenour may be reached at 758-4439 or sridenour@dailyinterlake.com.