Apple growers feeling the pinch

By John Boldrick

BELLEVILLE, Ont. (25/09/12) Randall Dempsey of Dempsey Farms in Prince Edward County, unloads apples from his truck at the Belleville farmers market on Tuesday morning. Photo by John Boldrick.

Susan Manning of Apple Wolf Farm in Stirling is facing tough times after a spring that all but destroyed her apple crops.

Temperatures reached 30 degrees C by mid-March mixed in with a hard frost and there was even hail in one case. Some of the Quinte areas apple farms were hit with some unexpected weather that all but ruined their crops.

“The majority of them would probably be suitable to feed (to) domestic animals or wild animals. There were very little eatable apples in this case,” said Manning.

The unpredictable weather also affected Apple Wolf’s unofficial workers – the bees.

“It didn’t effect bloom so much because a lot of the starting of the budding hadn’t actually come out, but by the time the blooms themselves were ready, the bees had actually gone back into their, I guess, hibernation state, so of course they missed the blooming season, so a lot of our blooms did not get pollinated and that was one of the reasons we got very little apples this year,” said Manning.

While selling apples for baking and human consumption is out of the question for the Stirling area organic farm, all has not been lost. Manning said hunters often buy up spare apples by the truckload for their hunts.

“We tried to get as much off the ground and off the trees as possible before the end of the season,” she said.

Still, the less than stellar turnout this year is made even harder after a banner turnout last year.

“Last year was amazing, we had so many apples that we couldn’t eat enough,” said Manning. “The apples themselves were just incredible.”

As it turns out, Stirling isn’t the only area affected by the rapidly changing weather.

Randall Dempsey is the owner of Dempsey Orchards in Prince Edward County, an orchard that has been in his family for over 200 years. He said that weather had a large impact on his crops this year.

“It was hot mid-March – too hot, everything jumped out ahead of normal, and then when apples and pears and plums came into blossom, we got hit with a fairly hard frost and that varied from place to place in the county,” he said.

The difference between this year’s growing season and last year’s is very substantial, said Dempsey.

“This year was different because it was hot, close to 30 Celsius, mid-March and then we had the frost when a lot of the stuff was in blossom and we had quite a drought period for a fair amount of time. Then of course this month I have had about 220 millimeters of rain so far, which is more than I require.”

However, Dempsey said it could have been a lot worse.

“My season’s not over yet, but overall it’s going to be down. I got hit, but I think my crop is at around 60-65 per cent of normal,” he said, “I know guys that only had 10 per cent.”

Dempsey said his harvest isn’t finished yet, certain varieties such as Ida Reds, northern spies and sweet apples are still to be picked.

“Most of your varieties kick in September, so September and October is the busy time for apples,” he said.

For Dempsey, this year pales in comparison to the best apple-growing year he has never seen, 2009, which he described as the best growing year he has seen in his lifetime.

“We had good rainfall, we had the perfect climate for apples to get colour, so size and colour was very good that year,” he said.

Clifford Foster of Fosterholm Farms in Brighton has had to deal with consistency issues as much as the weather. Foster, who picks his apples at Dunnett Orchards in Brighton, said he has been having problems with the amount of apples he has been harvesting this season.

“Lots of trees don’t have anything on, you might get a tree that has half a bushel on and the next tree doesn’t have anything on and even the ones that do have are pretty sparse,” he said.

Foster hasn’t had the problems with the quality of the apples, adding they are just as good as other years.

“There’s been a dramatic decrease in the quantity of apples, not the quality,” he said, “We got excellent quality.”

Foster said there are still be enough apples to go around.

“We’ll have enough apples to satisfy our local customers,” he said.

Foster also grows other produce on his farm, such as tomatoes, beans, peppers, potatoes and broccoli. He said the weather conditions have not affected the other foods quite as badly as apples. This is not the case for everyone though, as Dempsey said that his pear crop suffered greatly this year.

Blake and Sandy Vader of Vader farms get their apples from Waupoos and then in turn sell them at the Belleville farmer’s market. They too have had problems with quantity.

“The sales have been good, the volume just isn’t there,” said Sandy Vader.

While sales are good now, the concern is that with the limited crop of apples around, the Vaders won’t be able to continue to sell them throughout the rest of the year.

“Right now, I’m able to get the volume I want, but in a couple months the apples won’t be there,” said Vader, “Quality wise they’re very good, but I probably won’t have them till Christmas this year.”

While the quantity means that the number of fresh apples for sale this year will be limited, it also means that several specialty treats, such as apple pie, juice and cider also will not be as readily available.

“There won’t be apple cider, or at least local apple cider for us, the guy we deal with just doesn’t have the apples this year,” said Vader.

So what does next year have in store for the apple growers of the area?

“I wouldn’t even wish to speculate, that’s too tough of a call to make,” said Dempsey.

Foster remains a little more optimistic about what the future will bring.

“That’s a crystal ball question, next year will always be better,” he said.