Willamette Valley farmers go nuts

Hazelnut growers predict third-largest harvest in 10 years

By Mateusz Perkowski

The Forest Grove News-Times, Nov 29, 2006, Updated Oct 30, 2009

Contributed photo

Hazelnut farmers in the Willamette Valley estimate they'll harvest 41,000 tons of nuts this year. Oregon is the largest hazelnut producer in the nation.

FOREST GROVE - Pinot Gris, Pinot Noir, Riesling and other grape varieties weren’t the only stellar crops this year. The same favorable spring weather conditions that caused flower clusters to consistently set fruit throughout Oregon’s vineyards also contributed to exceptional nut development in the Willamette Valley’s hazelnut tree orchards.

At an estimated 41,000 tons, it’s the third largest harvest in the past decade – enough nuts to fill a procession of semi-trucks lined up end-to-end from Portland to Forest Grove.

But the origins of this year’s bumper hazelnut crop can be traced back to before spring, all the way to the autumn of 2005, when Oregon’s hazelnut trees produced only 27,600 tons of nuts. Unlike grapevines, hazelnut trees have an alternate fruit-bearing cycle: a poor harvest one year is generally followed by a plentiful one the next season, and vice-versa.

“The following year, there won’t be as many flower buds on the tree to give the tree a rest,” predicted Leonard Spesert, vice president of the Hazelnut Growers of Oregon, a farmers’ cooperative with a processing plant in Cornelius. “Part of it is the weather, part of it is climatic, and part of it is that the tree rests every other year.”

This year, a lack of heavy frosts preserved viable buds through the winter, and periods of dry weather permitted the hazelnut’s long, clustered male flowers – known as catkins – to effectively spread their windborne pollen in January and February. Warm temperatures aided pollination during March and April, when the trees’ tiny female flowers fully developed.

“Venus and Mars were in line,” joked Gerry Plante, controller for the Hazelnut Growers of Oregon.

1 | 2 Next Page >>

Facebook	Digg	Del.icio.us
Newsvine	Stumbleupon	Reddit