This year, the town of 15,000, which bills itself as the “Cherry Capital of the World,” hosted its weeklong celebration of the iconic fruit.
Visitors meandered through the crowd munching on cups packed with fresh cherries and balancing paper plates of cherry pie.
Booths sold cherry pancakes, cherry sausages, cherry barbecue sauces, and even cherry-flavored coffee. There were pie-eating contests, a cherry-pit-spitting contest, carnival rides, fireworks, and concerts with artists like KC and the Sunshine Band.
“The whole county is going to turn into a subdivision here in a few years. There aren’t going to be any farms left.”
As the Cherry Royale parade wove through town, the National Cherry Queen, selected through an annual competition, smiled and waved at the crowd from atop a bright red Pontiac Grand Ville Brougham convertible.
But beyond the pomp and pageantry, the cherry industry in Northern Michigan is struggling.
Even in the best of circumstances, growing cherries organically is very challenging. On top of that, climate change has led to unpredictable weather patterns, including late spring frosts that are catastrophic for farmers. Heavy summer rains followed by intense heat are leading to increased American brown rot, causing cherries to shrivel and rot on the tree.
Farmers are also struggling to control an exploding population of the spotted wing drosophila, an insect native to Southeast Asia that first appeared in Michigan in 2010.
Rising input costs, including for fertilizer, are squeezing profit margins, and a booming vacation scene has driven real estate prices sky high. Some farmers are selling their farms or retiring, while others are diversifying crops and products or dipping their toes into agritourism.
“The outlook is a lot worse than what the numbers are showing,” David Ortega, an agricultural economist at Michigan State University, said. Some farmers won’t even bother harvesting their cherries this year, he said, because it isn’t financially viable. “It’s just not worth it to them because the crop is going to be so bad.”
Climate Change Challenges Cherry Harvests
In a typical July, Cheryl and Alan Kobernik of North Star Organics in Frankfort would be readying to open their cherry orchard for U-pick operations and harvesting. Their organic tart and sweet cherries attract a dedicated following, with repeat customers traveling from as far as Detroit and Chicago to load up coolers with cherries to take home.
But not this year. A week before their U-pick season was to begin, the Koberniks pulled the plug on their tart cherry crop; it was too small and sparse to be worth picking.
“There’s a point where you have to say, ‘uncle,’” Cheryl Kobernik said.
They wouldn’t be shaking the trees either; they say harvesting their tart cherry crop isn’t financially viable.
Their sweet cherries fared only slightly better. They shortened the U-pick season to just four days, down from about two weeks in a more productive season. Even so, they only had enough cherries for each visitor to pick a small basket’s worth.
Cheryl and Alan Kobernik of North Star Organics pictured in their sweet cherry orchard in Frankfort, Michigan. (Photo credit: Miles MacClure)
While Traverse City claims the “Cherry Capital of the World” title, Cheryl Kobernik thinks the moniker and cherry festival are divorced from the reality facing farmers here.
Climate change and unpredictable weather are wreaking havoc on cherry crops. A late spring frost wiped out orchards across Michigan. At the Koberniks’ farm, a combination of heavy rain and hot weather in early July led to American brown rot that spread rapidly throughout their sweet cherry trees, further diminishing their frost-damaged crops.
Over the last 15 years, the Koberniks have seen their farming neighbors pack up and sell their properties. “In our 5-mile radius, we’re the last ones standing,” Alan Kobernik said.
The Koberniks’ challenges mirror that of cherry farmers across the country. July projections from the National Agricultural Statistics Service forecasted 2026 tart cherry production at 91 million pounds nationally, a 36 percent drop from 2025. Sweet cherries will also be in shorter supply nationally, with an estimated 17 percent fewer cherries than last year.
Michigan is the nation’s largest producer of tart cherries and fourth largest producer of sweet cherries. In 2018, Michigan farmers harvested 202 million pounds of tart cherries, but they haven’t harvested more than 200 million pounds since. In 2025, production fell to 109 million pounds of tart cherries and 24.6 million pounds of sweet cherries.
In Northwest Michigan, farmers will harvest about 40 million pounds of tart cherries this year, a quarter of the 160 million pounds harvested in a good year.
“The sheer amount of uncertainty is something that I think is weighing very heavily on the sector,” Ortega said. “There’s uncertainty over climate and weather, but also policy uncertainty when it comes to labor policy, when it comes to tariffs, and what that’s doing to equipment.”
Farmers growing apples, peaches, and plums have also had a devastating year due to unpredictable weather patterns and freezes. Other cherry-producing regions are struggling, too. In Utah, the nation’s second largest producer of tart cherries, an unusually warm winter led fruit trees to bloom in late March and early April, about a month early. Utah was then hit with a devastating freeze in April that wiped out over 90 percent of the state’s cherry crop.
Washington state, the country’s largest sweet cherry producer, has also been hampered by climate change, including in 2021 when an intense heat dome damaged 20 percent of its crops. This year, the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) projects Washington will harvest 200,000 tons of sweet cherries, 61,000 tons fewer than last year’s bumper crop.
The decline in U.S. cherry production could impact global markets. In 2024, the U.S. was the world’s third-largest tart cherry producer, behind Turkey and Chile.
“I think there’s going to be a potential worldwide shortage of tart cherries,” said Nicki Rothwell, an extension educator at MSU.
Large corporations like General Mills and Starbucks will likely swap out products that use tart cherries, like flavored syrups, for other crops, like blueberries, she said. “Then it’s going to be an uphill slog to get back into those markets, because we’re so short.”
Pests Add to the Headaches
Farmers have struggled to control the spotted wing drosophila (SWD) since the insect was first detected here 15 years ago. The fly penetrates the skin of otherwise healthy fruit and lays eggs, destroying the fruit within days.
Greg Williams, a conventional farmer in Leelanau County, grows about 370 acres of fruit trees across multiple properties, including 180 acres of tart cherries. He expects his tart cherry crop this year to be about 30 percent of his regular yield. SWD is his biggest worry, topping unpredictable weather and fluctuating cherry prices.
About 10 years ago, the pests began showing up on Williams’ crops. In the past three years, the insect has become a particular headache for his trees, driving up costs from increased insecticide use. “We have a couple additional coverage sprays for it, so it’s quite pricey on 370 acres to put two or three extra sprays,” Williams said.
These sweet cherrie have been destroyed by American brown rot at North Star Organics. (Photo credit: Miles MacClure)
Previously, Rothwell and other researchers at the Northwest Michigan Horticulture Research Center thought that the fly would only feed on tart cherries that are fully ripe or overripe, but they have since learned that the insect can lay eggs in underripe fruit.
