LAVALLEE— Fruit farmers in Northwestern Ontario say this is not the first time forest fires have delayed annual harvesting.
Smoke from the numerous forest fires in the region this season has resulted in a number of delayed crops, according to Honey Berry Fruit Farm in Lavallee.
“They are not ripening to the same level as they have in past years,” said Betheny Kinsman, co-owner of the farm.
Ontario's Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs has previously said that during forest fire season the smoke haze by-product ascends in to the atmosphere creating a type of shade coverage for fields or crops of any kind, cutting the direct sun resulting in a diffusion of light and reduced photosynthesis.
“The sunlight helps the sugar content within the berries to get to where it needs to be, to have their optimum ripeness,” Kinsman said.
In an average season, harvesting of their haskap berries would have been up to speed by now she said.
“Usually, we are long done picking them and starting to move on to our fresh picked orders, so the ones that are best for eating right from the branch,” she said.
“When I looked at them this past weekend, the next kind of variety that we usually start picking, they were still quite green on the inside.”
The Fort Frances area farm grows variety of haskap berries, alongside several other fruits like currants and sea buckthorn.
“We have eight different varieties and they all kind of ripen at different times, some of them are earlier ripeners, some of them are later ripeners,” she said.
“The earlier ones tend to be more of a tart flavor, so they do better for making into different things, whether it is pies, jams, glazes, beers, all sorts of different things.”
In order to time harvesting out perfectly, the Kinsmans have been working diligently with a Brix reader, a tool that measures how many grams of sucrose are present per 100 grams of liquid solution.
“The sugar content reaches a maximum about mid afternoon before it drops slightly for the evening, only to cycle through again the next day repeatedly until they become ripe,” she said.
“Or without that Brix reader, you can just check by looking at the inside colour of the berries, and when they are right, they are usually a crimson purple colour,” she said.
Kinsman said all that the farm needs now for a successful harvest is their Brix reader, mother nature and time.
“I am going to say at the earliest, probably another week or two.”
Every year the farm sells the first harvest of haskap berries to the local Hallett brewing for a custom brewed batch of beer, Kinsman said.
“We give some to the Hallett Brewery here in town, they make a beer out of it so a good part of the batch goes to them,” she said.
“Then there is a local resort, New Moon Lodge, we usually give some to them and they use them in their recipes throughout the year, and then usually a mixture of frozen and fresh we get out at that point in time.”
Having a steady queue of people waiting in line for the berries is not out of the normal for Honey Berry Fruit Farm.
“I have just had to say 'Oh yeah, I will take your name down and as soon as they are ready, which unfortunately they are delayed, I will reach out to you right away,'” she said.
While trying to meet orders and monitor the growth rate of crops, Kinsman said the smoke was not easy to work in.
“The haze from the smoke while trying to pick has been a little bit cumbersome at times too, just with breathing and getting headaches.”
While not unusual for Northwestern Ontario, the fires provided different challenges in years prior, she said.
“Last year we had some small cases from the fires, but it was more the heat that bogged us down,” she said. “It more so cooked the berries.”
“It has been interesting to see each year, how it differs,” she said.
Anyone looking for more information on Honey Berry Fruit Farm can go here.
