At Cherry Bay Orchards, in Suttons Bay, pin-straight rows of honeycrisp apple trees are almost ready to harvest.
Emma Grant, Cherry Bay's orchard manager, picks one off a branch and takes a bite.
“We’ve come in over estimates on a few of our blocks this year,” says Grant. “We’ve had … either the same or slightly higher than last year’s crop.”
Michigan is among the nation’s top-three apple growing states. And this year, growers in northern Michigan are seeing huge harvests for the second year in a row.
But too many apples can create other challenges.
Estimates say this year’s harvest will be about the same as last year’s record-breaking 32 million bushels. The average harvest is about 24 million.
Grant says two big back-to-back seasons across the country have created a few challenges, including less demand from processors on certain varieties.
Spy apples, popular for pies, as well as jonagolds and romes, which are sliced fresh and bagged, were in low demand early in the season.
But for a while, she says she held out hope.
“Sometimes at the end of the season processors realize they can take a few more. But in the last couple of weeks, we know that there are some that are going to have to stay on the tree," Grant said. "It's frustrating and it's sad, but that's just the way it goes sometimes.”
AN UNUSUAL YEAR
Erin Lauwers, an educator with MSU Extension's Northwest Michigan Horticulture Research Station, says she was surprised to see another bumper crop.
“Usually, if a tree bears a lot of fruit one year, then it tends to set less fruit the next year," she said, "so to have a big crop back-to-back is kind of strange.”
Lauwers said one reason for the higher crop could be a lack of thinning out blossoms and early growth in the spring due to bad weather.
Lower demand of certain varieties from processors is partially due to so much fruit from this year, but also due to advanced storage technology.
“I ate some evercrisp in March or April that were picked from the previous fall, so late last fall, and they were excellent,” Lauwers said. “We've come a long way in figuring out the technology, and the maintenance, and how to really get those fruit to shut down, so that they just kind of hold for a really long time.”
On top of that, Grant, with Cherry Bay Orchards, said certain varieties just aren’t as popular as they once were.
Some of last year’s crop was still good at the beginning of this apple season, and then came this year’s bumper crop.
STILL 'A GOOD YEAR'
So many apples to run through the line have created a sort of apple traffic jam. Grant says it’s been hard for processors to return the big plastic bins that farmers store and ship their fruit in.
At one point, she says the pile was getting low enough that she almost reached out to neighboring growers to borrow bins, but keeping open lines of communication with processors prevented that.
Grant also said that warmer September weather added another challenge.
“Since we haven't had the temperature influx of difference in the day and the night, coloring has been pretty poor,” Grant said. “So it's been a little sad because we've got these beautiful apples that we have to pick because of their maturity, but we know that they're not going to do so well with the processors because of the low color.”
Redder apples are more popular among consumers. She says lower temperatures to come may produce better color for the last few weeks of the season.
Despite all the hurdles, Grant said a good apple season is, well, a good apple season.
“It’s still going to be a good year,” Grant said. “The processors will probably be a little bit more strict, just because there is such a volume: they're going to try to take the best apples fresh that they can, of course, and that's what we want to provide to the consumer too. But overall, despite not being able to sell some acreage, we're looking pretty good.”
