Maine’s surviving cranberry farms finally expect a bumper season
Karen Sparrow says she has never seen so many cranberries in the past 20 years on her 3.5 acres of bogs at Sparrow Farm in Pittston. An hour's drive east in Turner, Harry Ricker marvels at the large berries turning red earlier than usual on his 10 acres of cranberry bogs at Ricker Hill Orchards.
Both farmers expect a stronger crop this fall compared with last, when a late frost in mid-May, along with heavy and sustained rains, hampered cranberry yields. Although cultivated in Maine since the 1800s, cranberries are lesser known than the state's prolific wild blueberries. While this year is promising a bumper crop, Maine growers are not always so lucky. In addition to increased competition from other states, cranberry growers have had to adapt to heavier rainfalls and additional days of extreme heat as the climate changes.
The past four years ranked among the 10 warmest on record in the state, according to the Maine Climate Council. What's more, Maine is getting one to two additional days per year with 2 or more inches of precipitation, and winters are now two weeks shorter than in the last century.
All of these changes can be detrimental to cranberry growing. Extreme heat causes cranberry crops to stop growing, and heavier rainfalls that keep the ground too wet can cause rot and attract insects, according to farmers. Cold winters are needed to ensure a protective ice cover over the berries.
"I don't worry about the weather because I cannot control it," said Ricker, whose farm dates back 250 years when it first grew apples.
Ricker's farm is the largest cranberry producer in the state now, while Mingo's Products in Calais has been at it the longest. They are among the 15 remaining cranberry farms in Maine totaling 90 acres, said Charles Armstrong, cranberry specialist and insect diagnostician at the University of Maine Cooperative Extension in Orono.
Due to competition and price pressures, that's down from 40 cranberry farms in 2003 with a total of 270 acres. The pressure was so keen that even the former largest grower, Cherryfield Foods, said in 2015 that it would leave the business after prices dropped below production costs.
"There have been too many years of low yields with really low prices," Armstrong said of the farms that left the business.
There's also generational pressure from kids not wanting to take over their parents' farms, he said. Farms that have survived have diversified. Ricker has diversified into hard ciders and wines that are sold at its three retail locations.
Cranberries grow on low shrubs and trailing vines, similar to strawberries but with runners that can extend up to 6 feet. Their market prices fluctuate each year, but organic growers that dry pick get the most per pound, Armstrong said. Growers that harvest by dry picking use a machine to knock the berries loose, a system also used by Ricker to get a higher price.
Other farms flood their bogs and loosen the berries, so they float, but that results in a much lower market price. Those berries don't hold up as well as dry-picked berries and must be used for juice. Organic dry-picked berries sell for about $5 a pound, Armstrong said, while non-organic dry pick go for $2 a pound. Berries harvested by flooding bring 40 cents per pound.
"If you dry pick the berries, they will keep until April the following year and still taste like they were just harvested," Armstrong said.
Cranberries begin to bud in the spring. They need to be pollinated by insects and also need sunny weather without rain for at least a week during pollination time, he said. If it rains too much or is too hot, honeybees simply refuse to pollinate, Armstrong said. Too much rain also can remove the pollen, making the flowers less desirable to the bees.
The berry plants need at least one inch of rain per week. If it gets above 90 degrees Fahrenheit, growers need to irrigate them because they cannot cool themselves by water evaporation through their leaves, Ricker said.
"That's an extra cost, because it takes hundreds of thousands of gallons every time you have to irrigate," he said.
Maine ranks sixth nationwide in cranberry production following Wisconsin, Massachusetts, Oregon, New Jersey and Washington, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture . Massachusetts harvested about two million barrels of cranberries in 2001, with Maine producing less than 1 percent of that amount. Wisconsin harvested the most at 4.7 million barrels, according to the department of agriculture. Each barrel equals about 100 pounds.
After price and competitive pressures almost decimated the market, it was rejuvenated in 1989 by the Maine Cranberry Growers Association. The market expanded in the mid-1990s with help from then-Gov. Angus King, who lobbied federal officials to get a special permit from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to allow for wetlands development under certain conditions. The five-year permit was not renewed, but by 1995 the state had harvested a total of 4,200 barrels, according to the University of Maine Cooperative Extension. By 2013 growers harvested a record cranberry yield of 35,870 barrels.
Maine has until now been lucky with having fewer extra high-degree days than Massachusetts or New Jersey, which have seen the heat take its toll on cranberry plants, Armstrong said. Those states also have seen warmer winters, which is another problem. The cranberries need a layer of ice or a thick snowpack over them so they can rest over the winter, which is called the "chilling requirement."
"Having it cold enough through the winter to protect the plants is a big issue for Massachusetts that will eventually become an issue in Maine, too," Armstrong said.
This year has been an excellent growing season because the rain came in spurts with abundant sunshine rather than long stretches of rainy days without sun, said John Harker, former director of the Maine Department of Agriculture, Conservation and Forestry and co-owner of Cranberry Creations, a Mount Vernon-based business that grows and sells cranberry plants to home gardeners.
But erratic weather conditions have become more difficult for farming over the past five years, Ricker said.
"We have more extreme temperatures, and we get extreme cold as well. It affected our apple and cranberry crops last year, and those in most of New England," Ricker said. "The late frost in May 2023 took out a bunch of our cranberry buds. We had about half the crop."
His business is not nearly as profitable as it was five years ago, but it has survived because he has a good market for his cranberries, which are sold whole and fresh in supermarkets, he said.
Other farms have been hurt by pests. Sparrow Farm had an infestation of fireworms, one of the most harmful pests to cranberries, for five years until last year's rains flooded the bogs so much that they killed the fireworms, Sparrow said. The cranberry vines had turned black from the infestation. But she has seen the vines recover strongly this year.
Pests remain a challenge with warmer weather and humidity, Armstrong said, because insects thrive in those conditions, putting more pressure on farmers to keep up with what nature throws their way.
"I just try to work around it as best I can, like all farmers do," Ricker said.
Lori Valigra is an investigative environment reporter for the BDN's Maine Focus team. She may be reached at Support for this reporting is provided by the Unity Foundation and donations by BDN readers.
