Is Traverse City Still the "Cherry Capital of the World"?

When I was a kid, we took a family trip to Traverse City to go to Great Wolf Lodge, and while we were there, we went to the Cherry Festival. At my age, I didn't understand why people were so obsessed with cherries. All I cared about was that there was a tent where I could try spitting a cherry pit as far as possible, and I really wanted to win (I didn't come close).

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However, over the past couple of years, the cherry industry in Traverse City has faced a couple of hiccups that could have long-term effects.

Climate Change

Anyone living in this state knows that the weather this winter was anything but normal. While most of us wouldn't complain about not having to be cold for months, farmers and the cherry trees rely on it being cold so trees don't bloom too early.

In an interview with mibridge.com, Greg Shooks, owner of Shooks Farm in Central Lake, discussed the difficulties that come with early warm weather. When a tree wakes up, it begins releasing the water stored within it to help the buds bloom. When a frost comes through and freezes that water, it can freeze the bud, killing it.

Cherries and other "stone fruits", fruits with a pit, are especially vulnerable to frost damage, so when Michigan experiences 6 inches of snowfall a week after the first day of spring, that doesn't bode well for the trees. While this year was warmer due to El Niño, it isn't an anomaly. Global warming has led to record-high temperatures in consecutive years, resulting in warmer winters.

Foreign Imports

In a Facebook post, Marc Santucci, owner of Santucci Farms, raised awareness of a program enforced by the Cherry Industry Administration that requires cherry farmers to dump large portions of their crop to meet a quota for imported cherries.

These cherries are beautiful! But, we have to dump 14% of our tart cherry crop on the ground to rot. Why? So we can allow the import of 200 million pounds of cherries from overseas! It just doesn’t seem right…

The goal of this program is to support the industry during low-yield years, but while it has proven helpful for big farms, independent farmers who aren't able to process the extra cherries don't benefit and are forced to dump perfectly good loads to overseas imports. In the long term, this could lead to small farmers having to close their farms for overseas cherries.

So bad cherry-growing weather, coupled with having to limit how many cherries they can sell due to overseas cherries, could be leading the Cherry Capital of the World down a dark path. If you're looking for things to do this summer, try going to You Pick days at local cherry farms to help support