Washington Blueberry Harvest Pt 1

Washington Blueberry Harvest Pt 1

Bob Larson
Bob Larson
With today's Fruit Grower Report, I'm Bob Larson. Washington's Blueberry harvest is well under way and things are looking good, not as fantastic as they were earlier estimated, but still pretty good.

Washington Blueberry Commission Executive Director, Dr. Alan Schreiber says it's been a warm summer across the state, but especially in Eastern Washington where growers are feeling the heat ...

SCHREIBER ... "The yields this year ranged from average to above average and the quality was great until later in the season when we had eleven days in a row with above 100-degree temperatures and that hurt us a little bit."

He says harvest there should wrap within a week or two, but Western Washington is only about half way through and should run at least another month, but will be a little short of earlier forecasts ...

SCHREIBER ... "The projections were very, very high, but again that long period of warm weather prevented some of the berries from sizing up like we would have expected them in normal temperatures and so the yields are not going to be as high as they were projected."

But, Schreiber says all about perspective ...

SCHREIBER ... "We still expect a very large crop out of Washington this year. It'll be mostly processed, but with tens of millions of pounds of fresh blueberries, the large majority of which will be organic."

Listen tomorrow for more on this year's blueberry crop and some of the differences between Eastern and Western Washington grow operations.

40% of our blueberries came from Eastern Washington, 40% from Whatcom County, 10% from Skagit County, and the other 10% from around the state.

Previous ReportMicroSoft Farm Beats Pt 2
Next ReportWashington Blueberry Harvest Pt 2