TRAVERSE CITY — Northern Michigan cherry farmers are not winging it when it comes to the health of their crops.
As they prepare for the growing season, they bring in honey bees. With a short window to pollinate cherry blossoms, it’s important for farmers to help speed up the process.
Each, cherry that you eat has to be pollinated by, a bee or in some cases by the wind. Honey bees originated in Europe and were brought to North America. They are the only species that returns home, to what’s called a “bee box.”
“So, we have plenty of bees in the world for all of that,” says Jason Tamm from Hilbert’s Honey Co., “What we don’t have in the world is we don’t have enough bees where they need to be. So, you need beekeepers. Beekeepers will send the bees to where they need to be pollinated.”
Hilbert’s Honey Co. in Traverse City sends their bees to Florida, California and Michigan to help pollinate crops. Each bee box can contain twenty to sixty thousand bees. Third Coast Fruit Company has used imported honey bees for 4 generations.
“We are reliant on, honeybees for pollination on some of our farms for the north, on Old Mission, where we’re farming adjacent to, pine or hardwoods, or open meadows,” explains Isaiah Wunsch, CEO Third Coast Farm Co., “We we’re more reliant on the 27 or 28, native species.”
While warm weather helps bring the bees out to pollinate the trees. Full bloom can take as short as eight hours or as much as a week.
“So, what’s always nerve-wracking about pollination is that we don’t know with cherries if we’ve had good pollination for about a month,” Wunsch said. “So, after the petals fall off the trees, the next step will be the cherry that will create a little fruit. Let’s, where each blossom was. That fruit, let’s start maturing into cherries. But if the fruit wasn’t pollinated, it will just drop off in June. So, we call that the June drop.”
Mother Nature plays a big role in a harvest, but with extra help from honey bees. Farmers can keep up with demand. Hilbert’s Honey Co. serves 65 orchards in northern Michigan and they say bees are the reason we have food on our table.
“I like to tell kids that they wouldn’t have anything on their pizza if it weren’t for bees,” Tamm said. “Everything in the grocery store that’s in the produce section is going to need bees. There’s very, very little that doesn’t. So, we wouldn’t be eating with it without bees too.”