Rain at the wrong time eating into already depleted cherry crop – Kelowna News

Cindy White

It’s the last thing cherry growers in the Central Okanagan needed.

Rain, including heavy downpours have come at exactly the wrong time for orchards struggling to get a crop off after devastating cold froze buds this spring.

“It’s quite a down crop overall so that’s where we’re kind of needing every cherry that’s on the tree right now to get to market. And rain and any other events that may happen can really impact that,” said Sukhpaul Bal, president, BC Cherry Association.

Those who do have enough cherries left to make it worthwhile have been using blowers and helicopters to try to keep the fruit dry until it can be harvested.

“Once they’ve split and if we don’t have fungicide, they will rot and rot the ones that are left behind. So we’ve got to apply fungicide to be able to harvest what’s left on the trees,” explains Alan Gazke at Gatzke’s Orchards in Lake Country.

Bal says he saw helicopters out multiple times this past weekend at the Jealous Fruits orchard next to his home. Unfortunately, the cold weather damage at his family’s Hillcrest Farm, along Highway 33 in Kelowna, was just too extreme to go ahead with a cherry harvest this year. However, there should still be enough cherries to go around in the Okanagan Valley if you buy from the grower.

“There’s plenty of cherries to survive the domestic market,” said Gatzke. “Those that are suffering the most have large acreages and plan to export. It seems that those are the guys that are dealing with most of the challenges.”

Consumers should expect to pay more because of those skyrocketing costs.

“Those costs of flying helicopters, we all know it’s not cheap,” notes Bal. “You have to spread that cost over the fruit that’s out there and when there’s a very minimal crop it gets to be very expensive to do that still.”

This is an election year in B.C., and Bal will be pushing politicians to do more to help fruit producers and the agriculture sector in general.

“The general public, that’s where they can help farmers to stay knowledgeable on what each party is proposing. If food is a high priority for the public I think they should be paying attention to that.”