As the saying goes, farming is always about the weather. Unfortunately, climate change has led to another saying being heard more often as of late: “I don’t know what a normal year is anymore.”
When severe weather incidents occur, they often carry an impact into the future for fields, orchards and vineyards. Some stressed plants bounce back quickly, while others carry their reduced vigour into the next season.
Unprecedented weather extremes in 2021 included a deadly heat dome and mass destruction from atmospheric rivers, and then 2022 came with its own set of issues with a spring that felt like it would never arrive and a summer that seemed like it would never end. Significant cold snaps and late frosts rounded out the picture of a tough growing season for most.
There were few winners as only grape growers (see the wine grapes report in this issue; table grapes are briefly below) came out ahead in many cases. It was also a blessing to have less pressure and smoke from wildfires.
Apples sized up, but yield was down
“I would call it a difficult season,” says Peter Simonsen, president of the BC Fruit Growers’ Association. “The trees were extremely stressed last year. I’d call it a hangover.”
Some apple varieties seemed to have done better in certain areas, but having travelled from Yakima, Washington to Vernon, BC, Simonsen saw the same situation in both the north and south. Crops were smaller than usual, and smaller even than last year. In some areas Galas were hit hardest, but in other orchards Galas were fine with Ambrosias being the lower yielding variety. Everyone saw reduced yields in some way, though the varieties and causes may have differed.
Rosy apple aphid was a challenge in the spring, but control programs seemed to keep it in check. Since the aphid was well-handled, the factors that took crop volumes down weren’t due to management issues.
It’s hard to define with certainty if the cold, late spring played a bigger part than stress from the heat dome or if these issues worked together for the decline. Simonsen feels apples grown on dwarf root stock played a part in this year’s disappointing results.
“Those trees are weaker in some regards,” he says. “They’re not as robust.”
Overall, the summer was good for growing and without the other complicating factors, should have resulted in a better yield. The late summer didn’t allow colour to fully form, but fruit was still of excellent quality and Simonsen feels the long summer was a good way to help trees recover from the stress of 2021. Irrigation was important this year with summer weather extending into October.
Peter Simonsen
Peter Simonsen, president of the BC Fruit Growers’ Association.
“Fruit quality was excellent as always,” he says. “The fruit looks fabulous. We had good colour, but I wouldn’t say excellent colour. It’s potentially going to be a huge crop next year.”
Two factors are a problem for the industry overall: acreage lost to other crops and reduced pricing.
“We’ve seen a 15 per cent decrease in acreage in the last two years,” he says.
In the northern Okanagan, that loss is primarily due to cherry tree plantings. In the south, it’s most often due to growers switching to wine grapes.
As for pricing, Simonsen says, “We should be expecting strong pricing, but likely won’t achieve it due to the fractious nature of our system and retail concentration.”
It’s a hard situation for growers and as a fourth-generation farmer, he’s as frustrated as anyone by the current state of affairs. “In BC, we protect farmland, but we don’t protect farmers or farming and that’s to our detriment,” he says.
Pears make out better than apples
Although the number of pear growers declined in previous years, those dedicated to the fruit had an “overall good year for pear growing,” according to Simonsen. “The pear crop seemed fine. They don’t tend to go as biennial as apples. I thought mine were a bit smaller, but my brother-in-law has them and his were a bit bigger.”
Cherry crop “almost” normal in 2022
“It was a relief to have an almost ‘normal’ year after the 2019 to 2021 seasons,” says Beth Cavers, general manager/program administrator with the BC Cherry Association.
Overall, Cavers says the season went well, aside from a late-spring cold snap that caused some damage. Late-season varieties were pushed into September for harvesting, which is highly unusual, but welcome, with the increase in prices at that time. The Summerland-developed varieties planted in North Okanagan are at higher elevations, which helped extend the season.
This combined with cold damage to Washington-grower cherries created unexpected benefits for BC growers. Cavers says there was high demand both domestically and overseas.
“Coincidentally, China’s Autumn Moon Festival was on September 10 this year, which means we had a good supply of Canadian cherries for that market,” she says. “Export programs to China, Japan, EU, UK and California ran smoothly with 154 growers and 17 packing facilities enrolled in them.”
South Korea was a trial export market this year. Two grower/packers ran test cases for the Canadian and South Korean governments to assess issues before finalizing the trade agreement.
Fruit cherries
“We are now optimistic for full market access for 2023,” Cavers says.
Exports to India are also proving beneficial with growth from $44,000 in value in 2019 to $670,000 in 2020. This dropped to just under $200,000 in 2021, most likely due to the heat dome’s impacts on fruit size. Cavers credits those increases to a trade mission in early 2020 by BC Cherry Association president Sukhpaul Bal and former president Christine Dendy.
“The 2022 statistics will come out in late February or early March and we anticipate another jump in exports to India following the 2021 easing of trade barriers from the India government,” Cavers says.
Staff from the association will be at Asia Fruit Logistica in Bangkok in November to form relationships and promote BC cherries.
Of benefit to many fruit growers was the introduction of the new BC FruitWorks program and the Crew Driver app which matches workers with employers. Created through funding and input from the BC government, consultants, and representatives from the BC Cherry Association, BC Grape Growers Association and BC Fruit Growers’ Association, the programs were “highly successful despite late implementation,” says Cavers. “These programs will be fully implemented in 2023.”
Simonsen says the cherry crop was a bit light in volume, but that the fruit quality at packing houses was excellent.
Stone Fruits struggled with spring
A very cold late December in 2021, a late spring and late frost all conspired to reduce the yields of stone fruits. With this variety of weather incidents, peaches, apricots, and plums were all impacted, though for different reasons, says Simonsen.
“I have peaches and the crop looked like an okay crop, but it came in at about two-thirds of normal,” he says. “The crop was not a big one.”
Quality was good for most stone fruits, but he did suggest the lateness pushed some peaches into the fall which may have caused quality issues.
“Prices were very high for peaches this year,” he says. “Labour was difficult. In that regard, it was good that it was a small crop.”
2022 a great year for grapes
Like wine grape growers, most table grape growers had an excellent season, according to Steven Schmidt, owner of The Herb Garden.
“It was a very good year, much higher than average yield,” he says. “The wine grape growers all had much better yields than last year’s. My Merlot grapes did really well this year.”
Blueberries
He suggests it may have come as a result of excessive bud set from the heat dome last year. Fruit quality was great as well.
“Nice tight clusters, large clusters and the flavour was good,” he says. “The sugars were there and the acids were there. Good flavour.”
He wonders why more growers don’t plant table grapes because they seem to him to have few pests or disease issues.
“I don’t do anything to them,” he says. “I only prune them.”
Blueberries down, but quality high
“Crop-wise, it wasn’t good,” says Jack Bates of Tecarte Farms. “Overall yield was down. Ours was worse than last year.”
While the quality of his berries was good, seeing the reduced yields was disheartening for everyone in the same situation.
Of greatest concern is the disease spreading through blueberries that was initially thought to be scorch, but is now showing up as negative for scorch testing in many cases. The disease, yet to be identified, causes damage similar to scorch with reduced plant vigour and potential death, but scientists are working to determine if it is spread by aphids, like scorch, and what its impact may be. At present, it appears to be in all growing regions.
“I think this whole virus, this mystery virus, it really showed it’s ugly face last year, after the heat dome,” says Bates. “I don’t know if that put extra stress on the plants. It’s been detected in our fields. I think it’s everywhere.”
Fortunately, like many crops, late season blueberries were extended into the fall due to the late summer-like weather. Some growers were still picking berries into October and seeing excellent late season quality.
“I think we could live with that every year,” he says.
Raspberries experience disappointing yields
“It was disappointing from a yield standpoint, good from a quality standpoint,” says James Bergen of Bergen Farms, and also a director with the Raspberry Industry Development Council. “Yields were not where we were hoping they would be this year.”
Again, the cool spring and the sudden shift into summer temperatures was definitely a factor. The stress from 2021’s heat dome likely contributed as well as the colder than usual winter.
“Going straight from cool to high 20s and low 30s right after; I don’t think that helped,” he says. “I think that we were dealing with some disease issues due to the cold. Blight possibly.”
He said yields were close to last year’s, which wasn’t good. They might be up slightly over 2021.
Strawberries
“Everything was down compared to what we expect from our crops,” he says of the different varieties. The only outlier was a fresh market niche variety that is hand-harvested: Cascade Delight. It didn’t see the same yield decline as other varieties.
“The price of raspberries is higher than historical averages,” he says. “It’s lessened the blow, but as a farmer, you’re sad that you’re not getting a high crop in one of these years when the price is way up.”
Cranberries down slightly, great quality
Anticipated yields for cranberries are lower than last year’s but quality is looking good, according to Coreen Berrisford, general manager with BC Cranberry Marketing Commission.
The commission hosted its first field day since 2018 on August 30 at Hopcott Farms in Pitt Meadows. About 120 growers and families, suppliers and politicians were in attendance.
The highlight for many was a tour of 16 acres planted with the newer variety, Vasanna, which was planted in 2021. It will be about two years until the variety is ready for a production-scale harvest.
Growers were enthused to see the planting due to it’s success at the Delta-based BC Cranberry Research Farm and in some small-scale on-farm plantings. Vasanna consistently produced more than an estimated 400 barrels per acre of berries that meet Ocean Spray’s size criteria.
Strawberries have disappointing start, strong finish
The late spring sabotaged strawberry growers, leaving both June-bearing and ever-bearing crops low in volume and with disappointing quality. Fortunately, the second flush of everbearing berries helped to make up for the disappointing spring, with berries being picked well into fall due to the late summer.
“It sure did help,” said Alf Krause of Krause Berry Farms and Estate Winery. “We picked strawberries up to [mid-October] and had beautiful berries.”
These were excellent in quality in terms of size, flavour and appearance.
“Unfortunately, June is a huge month for us and so we are thankful for the extended season,” he says.
The later crop slightly offset the poor results of spring berries, but it won’t be nearly enough to cover the reduced yields and losses.
With the late spring and plants already stressed from last year’s heat, it was a bad combination. David (Doc) Braich with JK Agro Industries reported fruit rot from the spring rain.
In summary
Of course, each farmer and grower experience is unique. While the fruit report is intended to give a basic overview of how each crop fared in 2022, there will always be differences from certain fields, orchards and vineyards to others.
That said, the overall trend for most fruit crops in BC this year - with the exception of table and wine grapes - was for smaller than average crop yields, but with generally solid quality. What is common overall is the hope that next year will be even better.
