Farmers in Nova Scotia are facing challenges after an excessively dry season, with limited rainfall in the forecast. Apple growers in the Annapolis Valley are particularly affected, according to Emily Lutz of the Nova Scotia Fruit Growers' Association.
"Most of the apple orchards in Nova Scotia are concentrated in the Annapolis Valley which has really been left out of all the major showers that this province has seen," Lutz said. "So still seeing dry conditions, still seeing problems with the crop, very small sized fruit, apples particularly. Peaches and pears were also impacted."
The dry conditions have reduced fruit size, creating marketing concerns. "When we're selling apples, they need to be a certain size to be marketable so anything under that size or doesn't have the right amount of color on the fruit is really hard to sell so farmers are faced with a very tough situation," Lutz said. "Do you pick it and hope there's a market for that fruit or do you simply leave it on the tree? And how do you manage that when you have a crew and you have a packer who's expecting fruit to come through their door?"
Tree health is another concern. "Those trees that are brown and dry, will they come back next year, or will they need to be replaced? And when we're talking about replacing those apple trees, you don't just plant one and they give you fruit the next year, they take three, four, five years to reach full production," she said.
Even if trees bear fruit this season, drought stress may weaken them ahead of winter. Lutz said it is already too late for trees to recover this year, though some rainfall would still be useful. "Really at this point slow and steady would be fine. A big dump would cause some problems I think for both this year's crop and the storage crop going forward," she said.
Despite the issues, apples will be available at the end of the season, though sizes may be smaller than normal. "There will be apples. There are some growers who have irrigation, who've got heavier soils and who've done a good job at withstanding this who've been lucky, so there will be apples, and there will be likely small apples, so I would just encourage consumers to not be deterred from buying a small apple. They fit better in your lunchbox," Lutz said.
Source: CTV News