Cherry news isn't cheery

Farmers who routinely pray for rain are cursing a recent torrent that has destroyed fruit crops in Utah.

About 30 percent of the sweet cherries grown in Utah were destroyed by downpours of rain and hail in June. A fungus has grown on about 50 percent of the apricots and peaches grown in Box Elder County, leaving the fruit still edible but marked in spots, and farmers will have to sell it at discount. Some watermelon and cantaloupe have also been destroyed.

Less fruit for sale means less money for farmers, grocers and packagers. Farmers will hire fewer seasonal laborers to pick the fruit because so much of it will be left on trees.

For consumers, however, cherry prices will not likely increase because nationally, cherry production is up 52 percent in 2009 compared to 2008, to 374,500 tons, according to a June 18 report by the National Agriculture Statistics Service.

This week, farmers are in their orchards, harvesting the remaining cherries, said Mike Pace, an extension agent with Utah State University who works with Box Elder County farmers.

Rain can be a blessing, as long as it doesn't fall when fruits are ripening.

"The amount of rain you get will cause that fruit to enlarge and rupture and split," Pace said. That ruins cherries.

It was hail that destroyed cherries in one of Steve Pettingill's orchards. He expects a damaging hailstorm about once a decade at farms in Willard and Perry in Weber County. "It was pea-sized hail," he said of the June storm. "It was very long and hard. It shredded the trees."

Pettingill estimates he lost half of his cherries.

Also lost were some of Pettingill's apple crop. Hail pelted a 6-acre plot of watermelon and cantaloupe, ruining the fruit.

Pettingill's apricots have a fungus. "It's still marketable, but it's a little tough to market," he said.

In the fruit business, as in most businesses, consumers make selections based on appearance, said Pace. Severe spotting will be undesirable to many consumers, and farmers will have to make decisions about which apricots they want to sell, "if you're used to having a reputation and having good fruit," he said.

Many growers sprayed their fruit to prevent the fungus but rain washed it off, Pace said.