Hudson Valley Apples, Smaller Than Ever
There’s the Big Apple known as New York City, but the Hudson Valley’s apples themselves are anything but that.
The round, red or green fruits are significantly smaller than they have been in recent years because of the drought Mother Nature has provided this year. “What’s happening in the Hudson Valley is that we are suffering a significant drought, the worst drought that we can remember for 20 years plus,” said Hudson River Fruit Distributors chief executive officer Dan Albinder. “I don’t even think we’ve had much more than an inch of rain since July.”
In response to the drought around the Hudson Valley, the farmers have had to dig deeper holes in their ponds and wells to allow more rain to be held. They use the water gathered for drip irrigation systems for when it doesn’t rain, which consists of long pipes called dripelines that water the roots of the apple trees. For a couple farms around the Poughkeepsie area, Dubois and Pavero Apples more specifically, they nearly ran out of water to keep their trees alive. The rainfall during the second week of September brought nearly three inches of rain and gave apple trees the precipitation it desperately needed.
While the apples may be smaller than normal, they will be sweeter because their lack of exposure to rain has reduced the amount of water inside the fruit– meaning more concentrate of flavor. On average, healthy apples contain around 25 percent water according to Pavero Apples’ CEO Kathy Pavero.
Sweeter apples may sound appealing but for the farmers around the area, they aren’t the easiest to sell in local markets and in commercial stores like ShopRite and Stop & Shop. “Smaller apples means the apples won’t fit in cartons properly, so the stores might reject them from us,” said Pavero. “Then what we’ll do, nine times out of 10 if they’re not damaged in any way we will try to resell and if we don’t, ultimately, it’s gonna go to cider apples.”
Even during apple-picking season, which has also come sooner than it did last year because of this drought, people like to pick the biggest ones. “They (customers and apple pickers) just don’t want small ones,” said Dubois Farm owner David Dubois.
For the farms in the Hudson Valley that sell apples to local and commercial stores across the east coast, sales are expected to be much lower than they were last year as much more rain fell a year ago and the apples were much bigger sizes.
However, most owners in the area have acres of apple orchards up in northern New York and even in Vermont that are much bigger than the ones around Poughkeepsie. And despite all the struggles that Hudson Valley farmers faced this season, there is no shortage of apples across the state because they got more precipitation than this area. New York will continue to be one of the top apple-producers in the country.
However, if climate change continues to cause the kinds of droughts the farmers faced this year, fruit and vegetable shortages may become a very real possibility in the future. In the worst cases for farm owners, they may have to sell their land and business if lack of rainfall continues.
But as every farmer knows, each year is different; it’s simply a matter of dealing with whatever Mother Nature throws at them.
