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Remnants of Hurricane Ike blow apples, peaches from trees in what looked to be excellent season
By Jim Carney
Beacon Journal staff writer
Published on Thursday, Sep 18, 2008
CHIPPEWA TOWNSHIP: The fat yellow apples are scattered underneath a grove of 500 Mutsu trees at Rittman Orchards & Farm Market.
On another part of the sprawling 125-acre farm on state Route 94, a sizeable portion of a field of sweet corn is bent over.
About 70 percent of a late peach crop is gone.
''A hurricane got us right before harvest,'' said 60-year-old Dale Vodraska, who owns Rittman Orchards with his wife, Peg, and their family.
He estimated the loss to his apple crop at between 20 and 40 percent.
Throughout the area and the state, farmers are dealing with the damage left Sunday by the remnants of Hurricane Ike.
Bill Dodd, president and general manager of the Newcomerstown-based Fruit Growers Marketing Association that sells for about 20 growers mostly in northern Ohio, said orchard owners he has spoken with reported a 5 to 10 percent loss of their apple crop from the storm.
Full damage, he said, ''is hard to tell until you start harvesting.''
Ron Kuner, whose family owns Kuner's Fruit Farm in Green, said his orchard was hit hard.
More than a quarter of his apple crop, he estimated, was blown down.
''They are bigger than baseballs on the ground,'' he said.
What Kuner is most concerned about is bruising to the fruit still on the trees caused from apples bumping into each other. He said he can't tell how much bruising damage might have occurred.
Until the storm came through, Kuner said, this year's crop was one of the best he has ever had.
Mike Ellis, a professor of plant pathology at the Ohio State University Agriculture Research and Development Center in Wooster, said the fruit crop had been excellent this year.
''Everything was looking great until the wind,'' he said.
At his research orchard in Wooster, ''half the apples are on the ground,'' Ellis said, adding that it is disheartening for growers to work all year and be ready to pick a great crop and then have to deal with such an event as Sunday's windstorm.
''It is not good,'' he said. But ''that is what growers face.''
Brad Bergefurd, a horticulture specialist for the Ohio State University South Centers in Piketon, said lots of apples around the state were knocked off trees during the storm.
''We are worried about the ones that didn't fall off the trees that got bumped,'' said Bergefurd, whose power is still off at his farm in Wilmington in Clinton County, where winds registered at more than 90 mph.
From speaking with experts, Bergefurd said it's his understanding that the greatest damage to the sweet-corn crop occurred in the southwest part of the state.
''The field crops in some areas got flattened pretty bad,'' he said.
At Rittman Orchards, Vodraska said many stalks have been flattened on 10 acres of sweet corn.
Family members and farm employees will go out and hand-pick the individual ears.
''I won't get it all,'' he said. ''It's hard to pick.''
On Sunday night, when the storm blew across his farm, Vodraska was picking peaches.
''The wind started picking up,'' he said. The next thing he knew, peaches ''were flying off the trees.''
But Vodraska said there is still plenty of fruit on the trees.
''We still have some nice apples,'' he said. ''We do the best we can.''
Jim Carney can be reached at 330-996-3576 or jcarney@thebeaconjournal.com.
CHIPPEWA TOWNSHIP: The fat yellow apples are scattered underneath a grove of 500 Mutsu trees at Rittman Orchards & Farm Market.
Get the full article here.
Comments
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Posted 10:31 AM, 09/18/2008
ok, this is to everyone who is complaining about the electricity problem we have going on right now...I live in Ravenna and half of ravenna has electricity but the street in am on does not. It does cost a lot of money to run a generator, but some of you need to think about those who don't have means of getting food. my grandmother lost her power untill tuesday night and she is elderly and can't hear. she's on life alert and if something happened in the middle of the night she can't get help, no phone, no life alert. sit back and think about what our ancestors did w/o electricity and running water. they made didn't they? go to a friends house, take a shower, i have a husband and two kids plus myself that needs to eat and shower. what about those who got all the rain and flooding water in the south? they don't have anything. people affected by hurricane katrina still don't have homes, now ike...come on people, quit thinking about yourselves for once and think about others that don't have the luxury of using food stamps to but food, or getting a gas station to get gas to run a generator. think of those worse off then you. you still have your car, homes, clothes and families....these people lost more then just their homes, they lost their lives, all we lost was power...suck it up and deal with it. yeah, it's hard, but use your heads, buy cheap and go w/o for a few days. God Bless those who were lost in the storm God bless those who were hurt, God Bless those who are going w/o and I pray things will get better. Good Luck to you all with thinking of others and not yourselves. Have a Blessed day
Posted 01:23 PM, 09/18/2008
I'm sure they can find a use for the fallen apples. If it was my farm the cider mill would get kicked in. The apples can be sold as seconds and I am sure they would sell. When I make apple butter we always buy seconds--who cares when it is boiled down.
