Busy strawberry U-pick season.
Farms still struggling finding pickers for commercial packaging
MILLVILLE — Strawberry season is on track to be the best in years for farmers in Cape Breton and it’s not because of high crop yields.
Although growing conditions and crops have been better than the past couple of years, it’s the high number of people coming to pick their own berries that’s making the 2020 season so good.
“Every day it’s been busy. I don’t know what it is, if it’s the COVID or what, I’ve never seen the U-pick be so busy,” said Edward Rendell, owner of Rendell’s Farm in Mill Creek.
“Next week it could die off, but this last week, it’s been great. There’s a lot of people out that have never picked before.”
Rendell, 74, believes a fear of a shortage of food or fresh produce is one reason why so many people are taking advantage of $2-per-pound pricing at local farms and freezing berries for later use.
“I’ve heard there could be a food shortage,” he said. “I was speaking to a guy who works at Sobeys and he said this time of year they usually have corn coming in from the States but this year there’s not a lot of it.”
Lorne Quinn, owner of Quinn’s Farm in Millville, said he’s also seen an increase of people at their U-pick. Like Rendell, he isn’t exactly sure why but he’s happy with the increased business after a couple of hard years.
“Oh yeah, it’s 100 per cent a better season than last year,” said Quinn. “There was lots of snow last winter and it kept the plants nice and secure. Snow cover is a good insulator. It keeps the plants from heaving out of the ground.”
The U-picks have been so busy, the farmers have had no choice but to close them for a day to allow the green berries to ripen.
“I’ve never seen that before,” said Rendell, who is hoping the weather co-operates to extend the season for another two weeks.
Ideal temperatures for strawberry growing are the high teens to low 20s. If temperatures get hotter, Rendell and Quinn said the season will be over in a week.
“It will certainly be over by the end of July,” said Quinn, who believes with good weather they’ll get another week and a half of strawberries.
Crops have been good this year, with lots of large, sweet strawberries in the fields, as opposed to 2019 when hot, dry weather reduced yields.
As happy as Rendell and Quinn are to see the increase in U-pick sales, both admit they’re still struggling to hire enough pickers for their farms.
“It’s always a problem. Every year you can’t get enough pickers to come and stay,” said Quinn, who’s been in the farming industry since 1988.
“After the picking gets rough, after the big berries are gone, it gets hard to get them to come back.”
Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, both farms have made changes in adherence to Nova Scotia public safety protocols. Signs encouraging social distancing are places around their fields and public areas. Hand-sanitizing areas are set up and Quinn said they have people walking in and out of different exits.
“It’s a little different this year because of the COVID virus,” he said. “But I don’t hear a lot of people complaining. People do what they have to.”