MATTAWAN, Mich. – Team leader Kendyll Osbourne looked at the stand of empty peach trees with a feeling of sadness. The entire Schultz Fruitridge Farms peach orchard she has worked was frozen out in the spring, with only a paper sack of fruit left to show by August.

“It’s sad to see,” she said of her Mattawan-based orchard. “We have so many trees, to see them all bare, just nothing on them,”

Michigan remains a major second-tier fruit-producing state based on temperate fruits rather than citrus and nuts. Due to a variety of weather-related issues, however, the state’s tart and sweet-cherry crops were being harvested at 24 percent below last year’s crops, and blueberries will finish at some 7 percent lower. Peach losses, yet to be tallied, will vary dramatically from orchard to orchard.

The USDA continues to forecast Michigan’s 2026 tart-cherry crop at 83.1 million pounds, down from the 109.3 million pounds in 2025. Sweet-cherry production was forecast at 9,500 tons, compared with 12,290 tons utilized last year.

Nationally, the USDA forecast only 91 million pounds of tart cherries, down 36 percent from 2025. That means Michigan is expected to produce roughly nine-tenths of this year’s national crop, an even larger share than usual because other producing states like Utah and New York were also badly damaged.

“We had some challenging weather,” said Tim Boring, Michigan Department of Agriculture and Rural Development director. “This year there’s a number of growers who won’t bother sending the shakers into the orchards.”

Many Michigan fruit growers endured a one-two-three weather punch earlier this year, according to the Michigan State University Extension. First, winter cold damaged flower buds as they developed. Next, repeated spring warm-ups and freezes encouraged and then killed blossoms. Finally, cold and wet bloom weather interfered with pollination, further reducing fruit set.

In numbers, most of Michigan’s fruit-growing southern and western regions recorded 15 days at or below zero last winter, with a record 33-below in late January at an inland station not far from the fruit belt, according to the National Weather Service. Then March was the warmest in parts since records were started in 1894. Finally western Michigan temperatures bottomed out in the lower 20s to upper 10s in late April, with at least an additional frost in early May in many areas.

As is usually the case, scenarios varied by fruit and grower location. Jack King grows 70 acres of tart and 50 acres of sweet cherries at his Kings Orchard in Central Lake, Mich., in northwestern Lower Peninsula Antrim County.

“We’re already finished with our tarts,” he told Farm World. “We were able to harvest our entire acreage in just over a week. We thought this was going to be a big year.

“We had a beautiful bloom, the bees were flying, and lots of flowers,” he continued. “Then we had a long, frosty spring this year. As the Montmorency tart cherries come out of hibernation they lose their winter hardiness really fast. They’re more susceptible to freezing at a higher temp.”

King had a short u-pick season this summer, but many other statewide growers canceled their u-picks altogether. Some growers were even left to consider switching to other fruit crops such as apples or strawberries for next season. Inconsistent winter temperatures are problematic for fruit growers, as trees and even blueberry bushes need sustained cold weather periods to remain dormant.

“What people (consumers) want are sweet cherries,” King said, but he conceded that he has young trees of both species. “We’re totally committed to cherries. That’s what we do well.”

Beyond farmers, Michigan cherry processors were at risk of facing a second poor tart crop. After two short crops, processors may have too little reserve inventory to keep supplying existing buyers, forcing them to ration product, seek fruit outside Michigan, or surrender business to competitors.

“They’re always trying to hustle new products and new markets,” said Nikki Rothwell, MSU Extension specialist and Northwest Michigan Horticulture Research Station coordinator. “There’s a balancing act of do we have a crop or don’t we have a crop, and they don’t want to scare away any buyers. They’re always trying to walk a tight line.”

Meanwhile, about 43 percent of the states’ 2025 utilized blueberries went to processing as well, a crop worth twice as much as tart cherries. The Michigan Blueberry Advisory Committee’s current estimate of 71 million pounds remained constant going into the harvest’s final weeks, down 5.6 million pounds or about 7 percent.

Growers suggested that the same winter injuries and repeated spring frosts impacting other fruits took their toll on blueberries as well. But bushes that looked normally loaded even in late June yielded smaller and unevenly or over ripened berries than in previous seasons. High early July temperatures and humidity at the start of the harvest increased soft and rotten fruit according to MSU Extension.

Michigan peach farmers produced over 24 million pounds of peaches valued at more than $19 million in 2025. While the official 2026 statewide peach production numbers have yet been announced, winter cold and spring freezes are also expected to leave a highly uneven crop, ranging from near-normal production in protected locations to complete losses in other western Michigan orchards.

That leaves Schultz Fruitridge orchard team leader Kendyll Osbourne looking at her stand of empty peach trees with a feeling of sadness.

“There are some other farmers around that have a little bit that we can use,” she said in reference to their retail operation, “but it’s been bad here.”