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Payson » Bugs, a bit of blight, too much rain and hail -- nemeses for growers everywhere -- were in abundance this past spring in Utah's major fruit-growing areas.
But while the late harvest of apples is still underway and numbers won't be tallied for several months, the 2009 season turned out "pretty good," said Diane Alston, extension entomologist at Utah State University. This, despite heavy June rains that soaked portions of Utah and Box Elder counties and hail that blasted some orchards south of Provo.
"For those who didn't get the hail, it was especially successful," she said.
That's because when the rains ended, growing conditions for the rest of the season turned reasonable.
"We haven't had a lot of wind. We haven't had real high temperatures, real heat," said Payson grower Robert McMullin, manager of family-run McMullin Farms. "It's just been one of those seasons where everything fits into place, where the quality of the fruit -- other than that damaged by the hail -- has been exceptional."
Some orchards did suffer crippling blows. Part of the McMullin Farms operation -- South Shore Farms, located at Utah Lake's south end at Lincoln Point -- was especially battered by hail.
"We lost sweet cherries and a percentage of tart cherries, but we were able to pick some peaches down there," said McMullin. "The apples were basically lost, except for some we sold at fruit stands."
Hail-blasted fruit may not look good to commercial buyers for major grocery-store chains, but hail doesn't affect crispness or flavor.
"In the fresh-fruit market, you have to have a particular grade. That fruit just doesn't make the grade," said McMullin. "We have what's called a 'hail grade,' but [major-store buyers] won't buy that because they don't look beautiful.
"Most of that fruit goes for juice, but the juice market this year is very poor, and it's hardly worth picking them."
And local fruit-stand shoppers reap the benefits. Hail-grade apples, while their aesthetics might turn off a grocery-story shopper, sell well at fruit stands, said McMullin.
"We tell folks they 'eat' every bit as good, that they've just been kissed by Mother Nature."
The result? While a lot of the hail-grade fruit made it into farmers markets and fruit stands, the majority was either left on trees or picked and tossed onto the ground.
Up along Box Elder County's "Fruit Way," nearly all the fruit from growers there -- they primarily grow peaches -- is sold at fruit stands along U.S. Highway 89 in the Willard-Perry area, said USU's Alston.
"They had a light apricot crop because of an early frost, and they had some sweet cherries, but they don't ship the volume out of state that Utah County does," she said.
At least it wasn't like some of the years McMullin Farms and other growers have faced. Spring frost can destroy an entire season's output, shutting down orchards and idling workers. That didn't happen this year, except early when apricots were hit.
One lucky Utah County hail dodger, Rey Allred, who's been running the family's Allred Farms for 52 years, was all smiles this fall.
"It's one of my better seasons -- maybe one of our best ever," said the 76-year-old fruit grower, whose operations along Wasatch Front foothills southeast of Payson only got light hail damage compared to fellow growers farther west. He lost some peaches to a bacterial disease at blossom time, "but that is very rare for us."
Overall, his late-summer harvest of Lemon Alberta canning peaches and Summer Lady and Honey Crisp apples was going smashingly one recent September morning. Shoppers were flocking to his large Allred Farms fruit stand in north Provo where a dozen workers were pulling crisp apples and juice-filled peaches out of giant bins and packing them into boxes
Making a living growing fruit is always a gamble, he said.
"Last year's Galas, for example, came right in on schedule -- good color, high sugar, no cracking," he said. "Now [in late September] Galas are three weeks late. Once those are picked, his workers will turn toward the final late-season crop, Fuji apples.
"Those take 180 days from full bloom to maturity -- May 5 to Nov. 5. Some years, we are picking them in the snow and the mud."
According to the 2007 census (the most-recent numbers available):
Of the 778 fruit growers in Utah, 247 are in Utah County.
Utah has 7,872 acres of orchards; Utah County accounts for 74 percent of that acreage, at 5,825 acres.
The next largest county in numbers is Box Elder with 110 farms on 938 acres.
Source: USDA
