Small Fruit Conference
Small Fruit Conference. I'm Greg Martin with today's Fruit Grower Report.
If small fruit is your game then you will want to put December 2nd through 4th on your calendar for the Washington Small Fruit Conference. Chris Benedict, Whatcom County Agriculture Agent explains.
BENEDICT: The focus is red raspberries, blueberries and strawberries. That represents the vast majority of this small fruit production in this area. We pull people in from Idaho, BC. I think we get close to 450 each year so it's focused almost exclusively on red raspberries and blueberries but we do do some strawberry stuff.
The 3-day conference gives producers the latest relevant research information delivered by the scientists performing the research.
BENEDICT: We sit down with growers in the spring and we (ask) "What do you guys need?" And so we really generate from that combined with what the Washington Red Raspberry and Washington Blueberry Commision fund out of their research programs but it covers everything from pest management to labor to berry health promotions from the consumer end of things, soil management. Plant breeding is obviously a big part of this and then we get into some pesticide applicator technology
The conference is presented in association with the Lynden Ag Show, a trade show featuring vendors serving the small fruit community.
BENEDICT: We do bring in a buyer panel. These are folks that are aggregators, they're purchasing from individual growers and they kind of bring up the issues they're dealing with.
That's today's Fruit Grower Report. I'm Greg Martin on the Ag Information Network of the West.
