Wrapping Up The Apple Harvest

Wrapping Up The Apple Harvest. I'm Greg Martin with today's Fruit Grower Report.

It's pretty much all done but the shouting.

FRYHOVER: Well I think that the majority of our apples have been harvested and are in the barn.

Todd Fryhover, president of the Washington Apple Commission talks about the 2015 apple crop.

FRYHOVER: This cold weather that we've had recently just puts an end to our harvest for this season so we are in the barn and looking forward to good things this season with our third largest crop in history at roughly about 116-million bushels. There was some discussion about revisions. Obviously that heat in August right before and during the early harvest of Gala was a concern but the weather broke and the fruit quality from that point just got better and better.

The final numbers will be released on December 1st and Fryhover reminds us the apple industry is very cyclical.

FRYHOVER: 2014 was a big year. We had 142-million boxes. 2016 looks like it could be that number or more depending on Mother Nature which plays a huge role in impacting our industry as far as fruit quality and volumes. So we anticipate that 2016 will be a return to a large crop volume. We're seeing more new, better varieties getting into consumer hands. We're seeing for the first time in two decades year over year over year per capita consumption numbers increasing.

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