The fruit growers in the German region Bodensee can count on a satisfying apple harvest this year despite the extreme weather, reports the German website Proplanta.de. The harvest will be 20 percent lower than in the record year of 2012, but the expected yield of 220,000 tonnes is close to the multiple year average.
The region Bodensee is in the states Baden-Württemberg and Bavaria and is the second largest apple cultivation area in Germany, asides from the Alte land in Hamburg. Around 1400 fruit growers grow apples on 7,000 acres here.
"It was an exciting year which finally turned out better than we expected," says Helmut Jäger, president of the fruit region Bodensee. Due to the cold and wet weather in spring the vegetation was slow to start. Then the summer heat caused long periods of drought. "Luckily it started to rain just in time. After that the fruits grew explosively." The apple harvest has started three weeks later than in the previous year.