'We May Be Losing Our Crop Right Now': What This Weird Weather Means for Cherry Growers

Mar 04, 2024

By Ellie Katz

Farmers in northern Michigan are used to the whims of the weather.

But Frankfort cherry grower Cheryl Kobernik says this week — which saw record highs one day and freezing temperatures with snow the next — has been especially difficult.

“I don’t believe that I’ve seen it this mild in the 39 years that we’ve been farming,” she said.

Kobernik says she and her husband are usually gearing up for the spring at this time of year by ordering supplies, finishing up paperwork and pruning trees.

“So we [were] out in our trees [Tuesday] in t-shirts and [Wednesday] in snow suits,” she told IPR. “But [the trees] don’t care that the calendar says February instead of March. They just know it’s getting warm, 'so it’s time for me to swell. It’s time for me to get ready to become a blossom or a leaf.’”

But Kobernik says when those warm days are followed by moisture and then freezing temperatures, things can go south quickly.

“They will still make a blossom, but there won’t be any cherry in it,” she said. “So we can look like we have lots of blossoms – aka cherries – but really, they’re duds. They’re empty inside.”

She says she won’t know what the outcome is until later this spring, but she’s taking precautions anyway and will likely report the whiplash in weather to her crop insurer.

“We will report [Tuesday night] and [Wednesday night] potentially as being frost events that have taken our crop from us,” Kobernik said. “We may be losing our crop right now. I mean, I don’t know. You just don’t know.”

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Video: Spring 2026 weather outlook for Wisconsin; What an early-arriving El Niño could mean

Northeast Wisconsin is a small corner of the world, but our weather is still affected by what happens across the globe.

That includes in the equatorial Pacific, where changes between El Niño and La Niña play a role in the weather here -- and boy, have there been some abrupt changes as of late.

El Niño and La Niña are the two phases of what is collectively known as the El Niño Southern Oscillation, or ENSO for short. These are the swings back and forth from unusually warm to unusually cold sea surface temperatures in the Pacific Ocean along the equator.

Since this past September, we have been in a weak La Niña, which means water temperatures near the Eastern Pacific equator have been cooler than usual. That's where we're at right now.

Even last fall, the long-term outlook suggested a return to neutral conditions by spring and potentially El Niño conditions by summer.

But there are some signs this may be happening faster than usual, which could accelerate the onset of El Niño.

Over the last few weeks, unusually strong bursts of westerly winds farther west in the Pacific -- where sea surface temperatures are warmer than average -- have been observed. There is a chance that this could accelerate the warming of those eastern Pacific waters and potentially push us into El Niño sooner than usual.

If we do enter El Nino by spring -- which we'll define as the period of March, April and May -- there are some long-term correlations with our weather here in Northeast Wisconsin.

Looking at a map of anomalously warm weather, most of the upper Great Lakes doesn't show a strong correlation, but in general, the northern tiers of the United States do tend to lean to that direction.

The stronger correlation is with precipitation. El Niño conditions in spring have historically come with a higher risk of very dry weather over that time frame, so this will definitely be a transition we'll have to watch closely as we move out of winter.