Killer frost batters L-C Valley orchards

Freezing temperatures hurt some orchardists in the Lewiston-Clarkston Valley early Sunday, ruining unprotected apricots, peaches and pears and damaging some of the valley’s apple crop.

But the pea crop appears not to have been damaged by the frost, officials at Twin City Foods at Lewiston said Monday.

The low reported at the Lewiston Airport for the 24 hours before 4 p.m. Sunday was 27 degrees, 13 degrees below the normal low for this time of year.

At the Schaefer Orchards at Lewiston, the thermometer dipped to 26 degrees, taking almost all of the apricot crop there, according to orchard co-owner Marlene Schaefer.

“We have at least a 90 percent wipeout in our apricots, and at least 25 to 50 percent of our cherry and peach blossoms, ” Schaefer said Monday. “It all happened in one fell swoop.”

She said the orchard’s walnut crop also was hurt, although the extent of that damage hasn’t been determined, The Schaefer’s apple crop “should be okay,” she said.

Schaefer said the orchard includes about 60 apricot trees, eight acres of peaches and 2½ acres of cherries.

“If we suffer the worst — a wipeout in everything but apples — you’re looking at a loss of between $50,000 and $60,000,” she said.

Oliver Rousseau, owner of Rousseau’s Orchard at Clarkston, said Monday he was able to save about half his peach crop with a ground sprinkler system.

“Where we had sprinklers running on the peaches, not a one froze,” he said.“The water was warm and it kept the frost away. We learned something good this year.”

Rousseau said this is the first time he’s used ground water rather than overhead sprinklers to fight frost, and he plans to run pipe to the rest of his orchard and use the same system in the future.

The unprotected half of his 1¾-acre peach orchard suffered “quite a bit of damage,” Rousseau said.

His apple crop was “thinned out” by the frost, but not badly hurt, he said.

An overhead sprinkling system saved most of the crop at Wilson’s Banner Ranch 10 miles west of Clarkston, where temperatures dipped to 27 degrees, co-owner Sue Wilson said.

The only problem with overhead sprinkling, she said, is limb breakage when ice builds up.

“We got some damage with the ice on the limbs, but it looks good for us,” she said. The orchard includes about 12 acres of peaches, five of pears and four of apples.

Officials from Twin City Foods at Lewiston checked pea fields for frost damage at Tammany, south of Lewiston; and on the prairie rims Sunday and Monday.

“Over the weekend, we were quite concerned,” said C. Mike Lien, manager of Twin City. “But we feel fairly confident now that there was no damage.”

Lien said the chances of a killing frost are about 50/50 at this time of year. But there have been frosts in July in previous years, he noted.

He said the pea plants are 3 to 4 inches high in Tammany, and “barely poking out” at higher elevations. The moisture content of the soil and the length of the freeze are critical factors in the amount of damage that results, he said.

Donald E. Warner of the National Weather Service office at Lewiston said temperatures slipped below freezing for about an hour just before dawn Saturday. But temperatures were below freezing for about three hours Sunday morning.

A cloud cover should keep temperatures above freezing for the rest of the week, Warner said. Overnight temperatures are expected to be in the mid to high 30s.

This story was published in the April 23, 1985, edition of the Lewiston Tribune.