Early freeze destroyed much of crop If you want to pick Pink Lady apples this fall, good luck. The crisp, sweet favorites, along with Ginger Golds, Roxbury Russets and Golden Russets, will be hard to find because of a hard freeze on April 21 that destroyed the fruit of early-blooming varieties. "We don't have any Pink Ladies this year," said Josh Morgenthau, who owns Fishkill Farms and its 40 acres of apple trees. While the freeze destroyed about half of the apple crop, Morgenthau said that there are still plenty to pick from later-blooming varieties like Gala, McIntosh, Fuji, Ida Red, Macoun, Spartan and Granny Smith. Morgenthau said his wholesale apple business was largely wiped out this year, along with nearly all the cherries, pears, nectarines and peaches. He plans to apply for a low-interest federal disaster loan available to apple producers. New York, which ranks second to Washington in production, has estimated the damage to the $575 million industry at $30 million to $60 million. Some farms lost only 15 percent of their crop, but the Hudson Valley was hard-hit. "This hardship follows a trend we are becoming all too familiar with — temperature swings that are indicative of our changing climate," said Gov. Kathy Hochul in May. Cold snaps in 2012, 2016 and 2023 also hit New York apples hard. Jason Londo, a professor at Cornell University who studies fruit-crop physiology and climate adaptation, said there isn't enough data to implicate climate change. Nevertheless, Londo and others are working to cultivate trees with later bloom dates. "Our fruit crops are not well adapted to warm temperatures in late winter and early spring," he said. But it can take 20 to 30 years to introduce a new apple variety to the market, and "we're in crisis mode," said Mike Biltonen, an orchard consultant in the Hudson Valley who began working in the industry in 1984 while still a student at Virginia Tech. Biltonen said that climate change has brought new pests to the region, including spotted lanternflies. "The nymphs and the adults are sap feeders," he said. "They're sucking the life out of the trees." Boscobel House and Gardens in Philipstown has 30 apple trees. Matthew Campbell, the facilities manager, said the April freeze, last year's drought and an abbreviated pruning window cut this year's harvest by 60 percent. "To see a tree without apples is heartbreaking," he said. Growers protect trees from freezes with propane heaters and blowers, and by spraying a protective glaze of water that freezes and insulates the trees from the deeper cold. During the April freeze, Fishkill Farms hired two helicopters to hover over 10 acres of the orchard during the coldest part of the night and push warmer air down. Fishkill Farms and other orchards also have diversified their businesses to be less reliant on apples. Rose Hill Farm in Red Hook has a cider and wine-tasting room; it also hosts weddings, puppet shows, Yoga in the Orchard and live Brazilian music. "We're a public-facing farm, and so that helps to offset crop loss," said Kevin Clark, the orchardist and farm manager. Clark said that the 13-acre orchard lost about 50 percent of its apples this year, plus all its cherries and apricots and nearly all its plums. Peaches fared better than expected. "Some kind of miracle happened with the peaches," he said. For several years, Ian Kingsley has been taking measures to protect his family's private orchard off Route 9 in Philipstown. He added later-blooming varieties like Northern Spy, Rome and Enterprise, to "get fruit no matter what happens," said Kingsley, who runs Kingsley Tree Care. Kingsley's family has been growing apples for about 40 years and has 50 or so trees, including Honey Crisp, Liberty, Grimes Golden, King David, Blondee, McIntosh, Cortland and Golden Delicious. They also have lesser-known, early bloomers like Pinova and Ashmead Kernel. "My Pinova has two apples on it," he said. "My Ashmead Kernel has nothing whatsoever."
