Cherry harvest begins on Flathead Lake
Hey savvy news reader! Thanks for choosing local.
You are now reading
1 of 3 free articles.
FINLEY POINT — Summer is finally here; cherry trees up and down the east shore, south shore and even some on the west shore of Flathead Lake are laden with dark red Flathead cherries. The Finley Point Cherry Warehouse was up and running on July 26 to handle all the fruit. Pickups and SUVs towing trailers loaded with boxes of plump, dark red fruit pulled into the cherry plant to start the 2010 cherry season.
Forklift operators from Monson Fruit Company, Selah, Wash., unloaded the plastic crates of fruit. The Flathead Cherry Growers assign each grower a number that identifies that orchard’s cherries. After cherry plant workers took a sample of cherries to test for fruit flies and for an additional computer test, the cherries were hydrocooled down to 34 degrees. Then they go to the cold room to await a ride in a refrigerator truck to Monson Fruit, according to Linda Knight, office manager at the cherry warehouse.
One family unloading cherries was John Beighle and his daughter Allison, almost 6 years old, from the Beighle orchards on south Finley Point. The Beighle cherries are all Lamberts with a few trees of Rainiers.
The Garcia, Flores and Aguilar families from Grandview, Wash. picked cherries at the Beighle’s 10-acre orchard. Picking cherries is hard work. Pablo Garcia said they started picking “as soon as it’s light enough to see the cherries” and worked all morning until 1 p.m. at the latest. Then they might fit in a swim and a trip to town for supplies before resting up at their camp in the orchard.
Dick Beighle said it should take seven or eight days to finish picking. Beighle and his family have been cherry producers on Finley Point since 1980; their orchard abuts Beighle’s sister’s orchard.
“It’s a family affair,” Paul Beighle, Dick’s nephew said.
The cherry crop looks good, too.
