The drought in eastern Iowa is taking its toll on apple orchard owners. Chris Gensicke has owned Allen’s Orchard in Marion since 2010 and says the drought and excessive heat had made this one of his strangest years.
Gensicke told KCRG TV the derecho killed about half of his tree canopy and many of the trees he replanted are still new and are struggling from excessive heat and a lack of water. “They’re quite stressed, and I’m quite stressed too, having to move around thousands of gallons of water a week,” he says. Gensicke has an irrigation system that waters most of the new trees he replanted following the derecho, but he says even that hasn’t been enough.
He says the trees haven’t grown as fast, the fruit might not be as big, and he said flavor may be stronger than we’re used to. “The main thing that we’ve seen with the weather and the drought is just the relentless sun and the heat,” Gensicke says. “We hit 101.5 on one of our weather stations…, some of them are showing sun scolding. I like to call them little apple sauce bags. They don’t keep well let me tell ya.” The trees have seen so much stress, he says people who want to pick apples this year might want to come out earlier than usual.
“I always tell everybody in Iowa that apples are a summer thing that happens in the fall,” he says. “If you think you’re going to be putting on your flannel shirts this year and your long-sleeved coats and having your mittens and your hats on and drinking hot cider while picking apples, the apples will be gone by then this year.” Gensicke said if we don’t get some rain soon, it could start to affect next year’s apple crop.
