Orchardists nervous

Nelson orchardist David Easton said people are on tenterhooks as firefighters battle blazes. He has orchards covering 60 hectares in the Moutere area west of Nelson where harvesting is due to begin over the next two weeks. ‘‘It’s pretty scary. We have no idea what the repercussions will be. This is totally unprecedented.’’ Easton said one of his senior managers was dealing with the evacuation of his family from Wakefield a few kilometres away. ‘‘If it jumped across the highway over Wakefield to the Richmond Forest Park hills it would be disastrous. That’s a worst case scenario. ‘‘We’ve never these kinds of hot north west winds like you get in Canterbury. ‘‘There’s still so much fuel that could burn. It will take weeks to make sure there’s nothing smouldering underground.’’ Easton said the region was tinder dry and there were water restrictions in place. ‘‘It depends on the winds and temperatures just what kind of apple harvest we get. ‘‘There are huge downstream effects if harvests are affected because producers spend millions on packaging and cool storage and transport. ‘‘We spend between $15,000 to $30,000 for each hectare on cardboard packaging alone. ‘‘If we were unable to harvest we’d still have to take the apples off for the following year’s harvest.