More on the Cherry Harvest
More on the Cherry Harvest. I’m Greg Martin with today’s Fruit Grower Report.
This year’s cherry crop has been a very strong one so far with over 10 million boxes shipped and more to come according to BJ Thurlby, NW Cherries. But he says all those cherries have caused some challenges.
THURLBY: You know it really made for a lot of fruit, it made for challenges from the production side of the business trying to get it all off at once, trying to get it all run at once and I’m kind of looking at this season as a 3-act play. The first act was the first 5-million boxes going out before the 4th of July. The second act was the middle of the season where we had probably some of our best product because the Bing is such a great cherry – all come off at once so there is 7 to 8 to 9 million boxes right there of fruit.
He says it was tough getting it all since it really did come all at once. And act three?
THURLBY: I think we’re rebooting and kind of retooling for the back end of this thing and I’m hoping that act three is a stable market that allows fruit to move through and this whole thing doesn’t continue to converge in terms of moving up the back end and the front end still being a little bit late
And how has the labor situation shaped up this year?
THURLBY: You know I have not had a lot of negativity on the labor side. Now I just know that there was so much fruit that came on I know some growers were hard pressed to find bodies at any given minute but overall it appears that the labor situation has been pretty stable.
That’s today’s Fruit Grower Report. I’m Greg Martin on the Northwest Ag Information Network.
