Spring storms that are more typical of the Pacific Northwest than Happy Valley haven't dampened the enthusiasm of local fruit farmers, much less their crops.
"The storms and moisture actually helped," said Morris Ercanbrack, whose family owns 275 acres throughout Utah County. "A lot of the trees needed moisture, so we're not complaining. The trees aren't overly loaded, but they've all got fruit on them."Local agriculture experts, including Tony Hatch, fruit specialist with Utah State University Extension Service, originally feared that the rains would discourage pollination of apricot and sweet cherry blooms, but apparently those crops were pollinated largely before the rains came. The warm spring weather earlier in the season led to early blooming, farmers said.
"We were really fortunate to get the hot weather when the trees were in bloom," Ercanbrack said. "We could have had a problem if the rain had come a little earlier or if the fruit would have developed even earlier. (A hard rain) could have damaged the actual crops."
According to farmers contacted by the Deseret News, including Ercanbrack, Howard Riley and Robert McMullin, insects were able to provide pollination for average crop yields.
"It's a better deal (to get somewhat smaller crops)," Ercanbrack said. "Sometimes it's an advantage to have a frost thin out some of the fruit. With less fruit on the trees, that fruit is able to mature, so in the end you actually get better-quality fruit."
Ercanbrack and other farmers expect the cherry harvest to begin in mid-June and other crops to follow weeks later. Because of the early spring, crops are approximately two weeks early.
"Things are looking good so far," he said. "We're certainly not complaining."
Fruit farmers still have a little more than a week of weather worries. Typically, damaging hail and frosts occur before mid-May, though crop damage from frost has occurred as late as Memorial Day.
"We're still a bit vulnerable," Ercanbrack said. "Every day we go without frost slims down our chances of any damage."
However, Utah fruit farms haven't escaped the year without some damage. In late March, a nearly 30-degree temperature drop (from the mid-50s to the mid-20s within just hours) froze sensitive blooms on sensitive stone-fruit trees throughout the state.
Hatch estimates as much as 75 to 90 percent of apricot blooms were damaged in Davis and Weber counties, which have the highest percentage of stone-fruit farms in the state. In some cases, farmers experienced a complete crop kill on those trees.
Ercanbrack, their Utah County counterpart, was luckier. His family's five acres of apricot trees should still produce a partial crop of fruit.
"We should still get some good fruit," he said. "You can get full crops sometimes with only 25 percent of your blooms."