YAKIMA — Fruit growers are tallying losses from an unusually cold spring across Eastern Washington, including three nights of record lows in some areas.
Temperatures dropped into the upper 20s and 30s across most of the region early Tuesday.
“That should be the last of the widespread freezing,” said Mary Johnson, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Pendleton, Ore.
Records for the date were set or tied early Saturday, Sunday and Monday at the Yakima airport, including a reading of 19 Monday, one degree lower than the old mark set in 1925.
From the Wenatchee area northward, average temperatures for the first 20 days of April were the coldest on record for the month, said Robert Tobin, senior forecaster at the National Weather Service in Spokane.
Across the central part of the state, growers have been using wind machines, irrigation water and propane heaters to protect fruit buds nightly since March 13, said Jim Holcomb, co-owner and meteorologist of Clearwest Inc., an agricultural weather service in Wenatchee.
Scott McDougall, vice president of McDougall &Sons Inc. of Wenatchee, said he couldn’t remember a spring in 30 years when it has been so cold for so many weeks.
The National Agricultural Statistics Service estimated cherry crop loss at 5 percent to 10 percent for Chelan and Douglas counties but had no figures for other counties.
Overall, “it’s too early to tell what happened,” said Dave Carlson, president of the Washington Apple Commission.
Washington’s apple industry is worth more than $1.3 billion and the state’s cherries add another $350 million a year.
Dennis Jones of Zillah estimated Monday he would lose 15 percent to 20 percent of his apples.
McDougall said his company’s 50-acre cherry orchard in Quincy had 90 percent damage or worse Sunday night.
Trees fared better in areas where late cold snaps are more common, said Teresa Baggarley, spokeswoman for the Washington State Fruit Commission.
“Growers in the Okanogan area were OK,” and the same was true for Chelan, Baggarley said.
Elsewhere in north-central Washington, it was another story.
Pear buds are damaged significantly when the temperature drops below 25 and unwanted skin markings develop from exposure to the upper 20s, said Ron Gonsalves, general manager of Blue Bird Inc., a fruit cooperative in Peshastin.
“We have a serious problem, but we don’t want to make it bigger than it is until we get out there and assess the damage,” he said.
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