PARIS – Maine’s berry growers are facing a tough season.

Fault last winter, says Barbara Murphy, small fruit specialist for the University of Maine Cooperative Extension.

“Many growers suffered severe winter loss,” she said.

The harvest of Maine’s wild blueberries – a commodity valued at more than $80 million in 2003 – will fall by about a third this season, said Dave Yarborough, the Extension Service’s expert for the crop.

“It’ll be the worst crop in at least the last 10 years,” Yarborough said.

The same deep frost that killed thousands of the state’s apple trees also killed berry bushes, said Murphy. A colder-than-usual wet spring – conditions less than ideal for berry production – added to growers’ woes, she said.

Strawberries, usually in their prime right now, are scarce and of poor quality, she said. Pick-your-own businesses are suffering economically as a result.

“Buy boxed quarts” at farmer’s markets and supermarkets, Murphy urged, in order to help growers’ pocketbooks.

High-bush blueberries face a similar fate, as that fruit’s season rolls around later this month.

Wild blueberries – Maine is the nation’s No. 1 producer of the delicacy – were slammed on several fronts, said Yarborough. Winter kill was significant, he said, but the fruit also was hit by disease this spring, and the crop suffers from poor pollination resulting from April, May and June’s cold, wet weather.

Maine’s wild blueberry harvest in 2003 topped 80.2 million pounds, according to U.S. Department of Agriculture figures.

The USDA’s statistics service said in a report released Wednesday afternoon that the state’s harvest was valued at $28.5 million in 2003. The figure reflects a solid increase in the yield over the prior year, when the USDA set the crop’s value at $17.8 million.

Yarborough, however, explained that the USDA figure only reflects the price growers get for the berries. By the time the wild blueberry crop is graded, packed, frozen and shipped, its added value grows to about $1 per pound, or more than $80 million in 2003, he said.

Dave Michaelson of the USDA’s statistics service said the agency won’t be releasing its 2004 forecast for the wild blueberry harvest until the end of July.

Meanwhile, the outlook for strawberry and high-bush blueberry growers over the next few of years is bleak, said Murphy.

Plants that were killed by the winter’s prolonged cold need to be replaced. Growers who plant new strawberry bushes now should expect extremely limited production next season, with improved growth two years from now, she said.

Blueberry bushes take longer to become fully productive, Murphy added. Plants replaced now won’t be generating an expansive and high-quality crop for another three seasons, she said.

Yarborough says the wild blueberry crop should fare a bit better.

He said this year’s crop was literally nipped in the bud by the winter cold, but the plants bearing the fruit remain hardy. As a result, next year’s crop should rebound, he said, providing that the weather cooperates.