08/30/07 Raspberry Harvest

Raspberry Harvest. I'm Greg Martin with today's Fruit Grower Report. It might not rival the apple or wine industry but a small, good tasting fruit has finished harvesting in the northwest. The red raspberry. They have been in stores for the last month or so and according to the Executive Director of the Washington Red Raspberry Commission, Henry Bierlink, this was not their best year. BIERLINK: Well we had an interesting year and as they say  what's the old Chinese proverb  may you live in interesting times, and we certainly did this year. We actually had a pretty good crop coming into the year but had a good shot of really hot weather which doesn't mix real well with raspberry harvest and then followed by a week of rain. We were really fighting to keep good quality this year. Bierlink is not very optimistic about this year's crop numbers. BIERLINK: It'll be optimistic to think we'll reach the 50 million pound level which we've been at the last couple of years, a little over that which is a drop from back in about 2002 we were a little over 70 million here in the state of Washington. We were a little over 50 last year, about 55 and I think we'll be lucky to get 50 this year. Demand for raspberries is not quite where they would like it to be and according to Bierlink they are investing in research to help improve not only demand but production. BIERLINK: There was a coop formed here locally so a lot of the growers put there heads together and said hey, we don't have to sell for the lowest price and so their cooperating on that and that helped out at least on the price side this year. That's today's Fruit Grower Report. I'm Greg Martin on the Northwest Ag Information Network.