Asparagus crop woes

Thursday, May 26, 2011

by SUSAN MANN

This spring’s cold, wet weather has been tough on Ontario’s asparagus crop.

Jason Ryder, chair of the Ontario Asparagus Growers’ Marketing Board, says excessive rain and cold temperatures caused a two-week delay to the start of the crop. In addition, “there have been some struggles with purple stemphylium.”

It’s a soil-borne disease that causes purple spots on the asparagus but doesn’t affect taste or nutritional value. Consumers still shy away from buying the crop affected by the problem. The disease stopped sales. “We’ve had asparagus being dumped and we’ve had asparagus being sold for way under price,” he explains. “It’s been a tough go.”

Ryder says the grocery chain stores have been working with the industry “to get through this so I give them the thumbs up.”

There are some sprays growers can use but they only provide limited success in controlling the disease, he says. In a year with average rainfall, growers are able to control it. But this year with rainfall far above average it’s difficult to control the disease. 

Ryder says the industry is over that hurdle now but the disease could reappear with this most recent bout of cold, wet weather. “This is the worst we’ve ever seen it.”

Currently the crop looks great. “It’s a nice cut,” he says.

It’s hard for growers to recover because the asparagus season is only eight to nine weeks long. He says there has been a $5 to $6 million loss to the industry as a whole. Growers are currently talking to the provincial and federal governments about using the Agri-Recovery program or for them to provide some type of compensation to growers for their losses.

As for future years, the cold, wet spring may have an impact on asparagus plants. But growers really won’t be able to tell until the fall when the plants fern out.

There are 110 to 130 asparagus growers in Ontario, producing the crop mainly along the sandy shores of Lake Erie in Norfolk, Oxford and Elgin counties. BF