POLSON — It’s that time of summer to take a drive along the east shore of Flathead Lake on Highway 35 as the cherry harvest is in full swing.
This year’s crop is a mixed bag as some orchards survived damaging winds and heavy rains to start July, while others weren’t so lucky.
“When the fruit is damaged, I don’t think I’ve had a crop like this,” said Bruce Johnson.
Johnson owns Buena Vista Orchards, roughly 800 cherry trees on five acres off Highway 35.
Watch to learn more about this year's cherry harvest:
“Cherries, when they are on the verge of being ripe, having a lot of rain is not a good situation,” said Johnson.
According to Johnson, heavy rains paired with high winds and even hail completely damaged his orchard to the point of making his cherries unpickable for market.
“The trees and the branches, just because they are weighted down, cherries were just whipping up and down, and you can imagine the cherries rubbing against each other and the branches, they got bruised.”
Bruised, split and mold are words cherry growers don’t like to hear.
Johnson is part of the Flathead Lake Cherry Growers Cooperative on Finley Point, which is operated by Monson Fruit Company and ships cherries from more than 80 Flathead Lake orchards all over the country.
Monson Fruit Company Field Representative Brian Campbell said more than a million pounds of damaged cherries will be left on trees.
“The problem is when you're processing fruit, you have to have a box of fruit that is 100% perfect cherries," said Campbell. "That gets to be an issue when 30% of them might be hurt."
Campbell said cherry market demand and the size of fruit are also major factors in this year’s crop.
“Small fruit is the first thing to go out of the market. At this point, we’re hoping that we can still get a good million pounds picked, picked and sold.”
Campbell said there are different ways to support cherry growers, like stopping by a U-pick orchard or buying fruit from cherry stands along Highway 35.
“Still plenty of good fruit.”
He added that the Flathead Lake cherry business is becoming harder to predict each summer.
“It’s kind of like the weather; I don’t know what normal is anymore. We’ve had really four bad years in a row, so we were due for a good one and we thought this would be a good one.”
