Tree Fruit Update

BJ Thurlby, president of the Washington Fruit Commission has been busy as the cherry season has been wrapping up and the pear & nectarines have ramped up.

THURLBY: The peach and nectarine crop is at its very peak right now as we speak and just like the cherry crop we are seeing varieties that have traditionally been a week apart or maybe 10 days apart starting to be picked at the same time and again with the heat that we've had that's the nature of the beast this year and I have no doubt that we're seeing that across the board in tree fruit.

Every crop this year has been at least a week to 10 days early.

THURLBY: We expect to have peaches an nectarines right through probably the middle to third week of September which usually you get into October, we're not going to see that this year but overall it's a moderate to nice size crop, it's not huge. We've had good support here in the Northwest and in western Canada and some nice accounts around the country have stepped in as well so we're feeling good about it.

And the cherry season is wrapped up.

THURLBY: It turns out third largest crop of all-time and I don't think any of us saw that. I know many in the industry, including myself, look at this thing about the 20th of June and said we're just going to continue to have heat issues and the fruit isn't going to be there and sure enough, the fruit was there so it makes you wonder just how big this crop was but overall a 20-million box crop is the new normal in the northwest cherry business.

That's today's Fruit Grower Report. I'm Greg Martin on the Ag Information Network of the West.