Janet Stacy mothers the family strawberry crop in Marietta as if it were one of her children.
From planting in September to picking in May, Stacy covers the strawberries from the winter frost, protects them from biting insects and even checks their temperature when it gets too cold.
But on Sunday afternoon, there was nothing she could do to save her plants from one of nature’s bullies. In only a few minutes, marble-size hail beat, shred and bruised the strawberry crop to a total loss.
“We’ve done this for seven years, and in two minutes we’re wiped out,” Stacy said as she culled through almost three acres of shredded leaves, browned bruised berries and beaten yellow and white blooms at Oak Grove.
Several local fruit farms have called Washington County’s office of the United States Department of Agriculture to report hail damage from Sunday’s thunderstorm, said Director Jim Woodruff.
“They’ll receive a small amount of compensation for their loss,” Woodruff said.
At Ted Lane’s farm off Ohio 676, the hail dented apples, pears, peaches and sour cherries.
“The fruit is small now and the dents are small, but as the fruit grows, so will the size of those dents,” Lane said.
Insects will probably be the final ruin for most of the bruised fruit, said Eric Barrett, Washington County Extension agent for agriculture.
“The bad thing about hail is once it damages the fruit the onset of insects and disease is rampant,” Barrett said.
Barrett said he spent Monday surveying the damage at several local farms. At this early stage in the farming season, he said fruit sustained the most losses. If hail hits later in the season, it can also do extensive damage to sweet corn, Barrett said.
Lane said he plans to spray his orchard to save some of the fruit from the insects. He said he is also worried about bugs getting into the tree where the hail chipped away at the bark.
If apples can mature with only slight dents, Lane said he might be able to at least salvage some cider.
“It’s hard to assess now,” Lane said of his five-acre orchard. “They are pretty rough looking. We’ll know (the extent of damage) in a week.”
At the strawberry farm, Stacy said the family was about 10 days away from opening up the crop to visitors for the traditional season of picking the strawberries and agricultural field trips.
“My biggest concern is our customers,” Stacy said. “Now I’ve got the job to get the word out that we’re not going to be here, and it wasn’t our choice.”
Stacy’s daughter, Amanda, 15, said she will miss field trips with the little kids. Amanda, her brothers Todd, 10, and Tyler, 7, and father, Bill, all worked to take care of the strawberry crop.
Even if farmers knew of Sunday’s hail in advance, there wasn’t much they could do Barrett said. He said only large commercial farmers buy expensive machines that emit large sonic bursts into the air to break up hail before it hits a crop. They probably use it once every five years, Barrett said. While hail is common every spring, such a pounding by large hail is rare, Barrett said.
Sunday’s hail was reported in only some parts of Washington County, and it varied in amount and size. The fast-moving thunderstorm also dumped more than 2 inches of rain along with wind gusts up to 40 mph.