2016 Cherry Season Outlook

If the cherry tree in my front yard is any indication the cherry bloom is in full swing.

THURLBY: We've got a nice bloom going from north to south. Not asll areas have bloomed yet but certainly the Yakima Valley and the Tri-Cities and parts of Wenatchee and further north into the state so it's very positive. This weather that we've seen in the last week, we've seen the degree day numbers just kind of jump up.

BJ Thurlby with Northwest Cherries says those degree days are key to the crop.

THURLBY: Which is what we use as kind of our scientific measurement relative to where this crop is going to be relative to timing, when is it going to start to come off. It's been a warmer spring and certainly our degree days are higher than normal but they're behind 2015 and 2014 right now. Very similar to 2013.

He says there is one other indicator that they are looking at and liking.

THURLBY: We hope that we see this through the whole season is from the southern districts to the northern districts we're seeing this really nice spread in terms of timing which means that gives our industry that opportunity to make an orderly marketing, sales strategy throughout the year versus like last year when it got extremely hot, we had three weeks in there of over 100 degree heat and it kind of pushed the crop together.

That's today's Fruit Grower Report. I'm Greg Martin on the Ag Information Network of the West.