WATCH: Forget the tractor, get the chopper

Spring sure has been taking its sweet time and local fruit growers are hoping the unusual cold doesn’t leave a sour taste when it comes to their crops.

Weather challenges over the last year have been relentless. After last summer’s record-breaking heat, and the colder than normal mid-winter snaps, spring has been reluctant to make an appearance - although we may have finally turned a corner.

After several sub-zero overnights the last week, including Tuesday night and a weekend that felt more like December at times, temperatures are moving upwards.

But the recent cold has the potential to damage the cherry trees as they hit a critical blossoming time.

That has resulted in some creative and drastic actions. Some farmers have been activating wind machines or even hiring helicopters to play with mother nature.

“What happens with frost is it settles in pockets on the ground, that’s where the coldest air sinks” Glen Lucas, who manages the BC Fruit Growers’ Association, explained to Kelowna10.

Warmer air can be found just 20 or 30 feet above the cold ground.

“The wind machines on the posts [in the orchards] move the air around and mixes it, and the same thing with the helicopters. The downdraft blows the warmer air down and mixes it up.”

He added the helicopters have thermometers onboard to detect if the air they’re flying through is indeed warmer and suitable to be blown downward.

Lucas said using helicopters is an expense growers would prefer to avoid – it can cost around $1,000 for a 10-15 minute flyover – but if it means saving crop, then it’s worth it.

Other growers, like Alan Gatzke in Lake Country, have special sprinkling systems that can deliberately coat the branches in a thin film of warmer water that creates a sort of very short-lived ice insulation blanket and reverse thermal energy that draws warmer moisture through the trees.

“Water converting phases into ice gives off heat, so when you make ice, you’re actually giving off heat (by transmitting energy),” Gatzke told Vernon Matters.

“It absorbs heat to melt ice, but to create ice the water gives off its heat. So as long as we leave the irrigation running through the cold period there is a film of water around the blooms and around the trees, and the creation of the ice on the ground, all the heat that was in the water is slowly drifting up through the trees.”

Meanwhile, Lucas says extreme weather over the last 10 months has played a role in making growers "concerned and watchful."

“We had the heat dome that stressed the trees going into the winter. We had very cold weather in December, and now we’ve got the cool spring to contend with,” he said.

But he’s hopeful things have turned a corner and there are some potentially brighter lights at the end of the tunnel for local growers. There has been late snowfall in parts of the U.S., which will bump up prices, and, according to Lucas, because B.C.’s season comes later, will mean higher prices here, too.

He said growers factor in up to a 30 per cent damage ratio for their crop, knowing that can actually lead to the rest of the crop becoming bigger and juicier.

“Every farmer I know loves to grow high quality fruit and really appreciates the support of the local consumer. So, they love what they do and that others love what they do.”