Last year’s national apple harvest was a record one, according to the U.S. Apple Association.
In Michigan, a strong year has driven down prices for some varieties and led to delays at packing plants.
Emma Grant, who runs Cherry Bay Orchards in Suttons Bay, hopes some of these issues will be resolved this season.
“We’ve never used this before,” she said, opening a bucket of thick white liquid. “But as there were more and more apples in Michigan and the packers needed more and more time to pack, we decided to give it a try.”
The liquid is a plant growth regulator; she and her colleagues tested the concentrate by mixing it with water and spraying a small area of apple trees with Premier Honeycrisp.
“Right now we are spraying this stuff in hopes of delaying the ripening of Premier Honeycrisp [apples],” Grant said. “They turn red on the tree, and then when we finish picking the other apples and pick them, they are still at the ripeness level for storage.”
We hope that these early apples will be as red as possible without becoming overripe. This will give them a better chance of being collected, stored, packaged and ultimately sold to consumers.
The harvest this year is expected to be large, but smaller than last year. However, researchers say it’s unusual to see this happen three years in a row.
Chris Gerlach says that’s partly because we’re planting more apple trees across the country.
”We’ve planted about 30,35,000 acres of apples in the last five years,” said Gerlach, who tracks analysis from the Apple Association of America, the apple industry trade association.
“You wouldn’t plant an apple tree on top of your grandfather’s apple tree,” Gerlach said. “You’re not going to plant 400 trees an acre with a huge canopy, and you’re going to have to spend a lot of time and effort trimming or harvesting the trees.”
Most manufacturers are moving to high-density systems. These lattice trees look like walls of fruit.
They grow more apples in less space and pick them more easily—something that must be done by hand if the apples are sold fresh. In addition, according to Gerlach, the quality of the fruit is higher than ever before.
Gerlach said some growers suffered losses because the record 2023 harvest led to such low prices for some varieties.
“Usually at the end of the season, these apple growers would receive a check in the mail. This year, many growers received bills in the mail because their apples were worth less than the cost of service.”
In addition to high labor costs and other costs such as fuel, producers must pay for storage, packaging of apples and commission subsidies for industry sellers.
“Usually at the end of the season, apple growers will take the selling price of the apples minus the cost of those services and then receive a check in the mail,” Gerlach said. “This year, many growers received bills in the mail because their apples were worth less than the cost of service.”
This is unsustainable, especially for small and medium-sized growers—the same growers who own many orchards in northern Michigan.
Gerlach said U.S. apple producers are consolidating and seeing more investment from private equity and foreign sovereign wealth funds. He said the trend will only continue as labor costs rise, making it difficult to make money from fruit alone.
“There is a lot of competition for grapes, clementines, avocados and other products on the shelves today,” he said. “Some people are talking about what we need to do to promote apples as a category, not just Honeycrisp versus Red Delicious, but apples versus other products.”
Still, Gerlach said growers should see some relief this growing season. This year is shaping up to be a big one for Apple, but there are still far fewer apples than last year.
In Suttons Bay, a plant growth regulator that Emma Grant sprayed more than a month ago had the desired effect: it gave some apples more time to turn red without becoming overripe. The redder the apple, the more attractive it is to packers.
Now she said she’ll have to wait and see if the same conditioner helps the apples store better before they’re packaged and sold.
Post time: Oct-10-2024