Cherry glut could soften market

With lots of fruit on the trees here in Montana and a bumper crop in Washington state, growers may well decide to leave some Flathead Lake cherries unpicked this season.

"The market is bad," said Marilyn Bowman, of Bowman Orchards near Yellow Bay. "We're probably not going to pick everything."

Bowman said that a glut of cherries in Washington, as well as some new varieties in that state that now compete with the late-ripening Flathead cherries — combined with a sour economy overall — have created a potentially tough year for local growers.

In addition to the tough market, Bowman said her cherries this year are a little on the small side, no problem when it comes to the taste, but a trait that can be off-putting to grocers who might put appearance before flavor.

"Consumers like big cherries," she said, 'so the grocery store is going to show them big cherries."

As a result, the picking season is slow to get under way at Bowman Orchards, where cherries are being left on the tree and irrigated in hopes they gain some size while the market improves.

If it doesn't, Bowman said they will be "choosy" about what trees they pick to focus on the biggest fruit.

If that's the case, Bowman said there will be a trickle down effect with fewer seasonal workers employed and thus fewer of them spending money locally.

"It affects people all the way down the line," she said.

Ken Edgington, owner of Bear Dance Orchards and board member with the Flathead Cherry Growers Association, agreed that there might not be much of a market for small cherries, but said that overall the cherry market didn't look terrible.

"Washington had the same thing we did with a heavy bloom and a lot of cherries on trees," he said. "Last time I checked, the national market was good."

Edgington said one strategy being employed in Washington was that packing plants and wharehouses were only accepting the larger, premium cherries, which helps keep demand up.

"Since there's such a massive amount, they're just putting out the premium stuff," he said. "So some of the smaller cherries that might normally make it market aren't going this year."

But while the macroeconomics of the Flathead cherry business is gloomy, the picture on the local front is rosier.

Bowman said walk-up traffic has been brisk so far and that repeat customers are coming back as they usually do. Because Bowman Orchards offers a wide variety of cherry-related products, it draws people for all manner of reasons.

On Monday afternoon a couple pulled up and spent more than $200 on bottles of the orchard's huckleberry and cherry wine.

"That was nice," Bowman said afterward, laughing.

Business at some of the "U-Pick" orchards has been fine too.

Alla Crosby of Crosby Orchards south of Woods Bay said business had just started picking up in the last few days as the cherries ripened. But one group from out of town had come in Monday morning and picked 150 pounds of cherries.

"Some of our trees are picked over, but some are still untouched," Welton Crosby said.

The way the next month of picking pans out, though, depends largely on the weather, according to Bowman.

So far the East Shore of Flathead Lake has been lucky as potentially catastrophic rains have bypassed the area. Once they're almost ripe or all the way there, cherries respond badly to excessive moisture because the fruit's skin can't stretch to accommodate the swelling as the cherry absorbs water.

As a result, the Flathead Cherry Growers Association keeps contracts for private pilots with helicopters to fly low over orchards after a late-season rainstorm to dry off the fruit.

Now the growers need the weather to avoid both moisture and extreme heat to maximize the amount of time the cherries can stay on the trees before being picked and when they'll begin to spoil.

"Every year is different," Bowman said, noting the Bowman's family history of nearly 100 years at the orchard. "And this year, it's going to be a different one."