More on Cherries

More on Cherries. I'm Greg Martin with today's Fruit Grower Report. As I've already observed this will be an interesting year for northwest cherry growers. Gip Redman with the Oregon Cherry Growers says it is definitely a mixed bag of cherries so far this year. REDMAN: The estimation process that the Washington State Fruit Commission – that was pegged at a little over 16 million the first time, came back at 15.6 the second time so it will be interesting to see what the third time is. The 5 state estimate came in at around 14 million boxes which Redman feels may be on the low side. But the weather has been playing a big factor with cherry growth. REDMAN: Going to the Oregon area, the Dalles really got caught in a pretty good situation. They were really budding out but weren't really blooming when the cold weather hit prior to bloom and when it finally broke the Dalles went ahead and bloomed during a fairly nice period of time and the bees were working and so I was expecting really a very nice crop. Frost did not really come into play much this year with some windy conditions. REDMAN: For whatever reason the crop is not as good as I thought it should have been but it's still a nice crop in the Dalles area. Tomorrow Redman looks at all the growing areas. That's today's Fruit Grower Report. I'm Greg Martin on the Ag Information Network.