Tudor Ranch <\/a>Inc., called the heat wave \u201cunexpected\u201d and said it is \u201ckeeping us farmers on our toes, that\u2019s for sure.\u201d<\/p>\nFor grapes, some of the concern is immediate. <\/p>\n
Tudor said this kind of heat can create \u201ca real situation and a real danger\u201d during bloom, when bunches can lose too many berries and fail to develop the full, healthy shape growers and shoppers want. <\/p>\n
He said the heat can act like someone putting \u201ctheir foot on the gas pedal,\u201d accelerating development so quickly that growers are left trying to manage a process they cannot fully slow down.<\/p>\n
But the bigger concern is the one farmers cannot yet measure.<\/p>\n
\u201cI don\u2019t know,\u201d Tudor said when asked what this stretch of heat could ultimately mean for this year\u2019s crop. \u201cWe\u2019ve never had this kind of weather for an extent, you know, this time of year.\u201d<\/p>\n
He said he has \u201cdefinitely\u201d had concerns about crop quality, explaining that when heat units pile up too quickly, grapes can mature faster than the berries size up. The result, he said, can be fruit that still tastes good but comes in smaller than expected, cutting into tonnage and pack-out.<\/p>\n
And when asked how this year compares with others, Tudor was blunt: \u201cWe\u2019ve never had a year like this weather-wise.\u201d<\/p>\n
So the question now is bigger than what is growing in those fields.<\/p>\n
It is whether this record-shattering Western heat wave is changing the season before it has fully begun and what that could mean for crops, harvest timing, and the farmers trying to stay ahead of something they say they have never seen arrive this way before.<\/p>\n
News Channel 3\u2019s Garrett Hottle has been speaking with farmers, industry experts, and touring farms and fields with the Riverside County Farm Bureu and Boy & Girls Club of Coachella Valley. Watch his full report tonight on a record-shattering heat wave now turning into a desert mystery.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"PALM DESERT, Calif (KESQ) It’s something you’ll often ask your neighbor or the person sitting next to you…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":541606,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[47],"tags":[192,79],"class_list":["post-541605","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-environment","tag-environment","tag-science"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/541605","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=541605"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/541605\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/541606"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=541605"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=541605"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=541605"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}