Agriculture
Climate Change Might Be Threatening the Future of Apples
Warmer, rainier springs are a boon to fire blight, a disease that hits cider apple trees hard. It may soon threaten all apples, and other fruit crops.
Fire blight is a bacterial pathogen that spreads easily during blooming season and has the potential to kill not just individual apple trees but entire orchards.
Photographer: Karolina Wojtasik/BloombergThis article is for subscribers only.
Patrick and Sara McGuire have been growing apples since they were married 25 years ago. Their 150 acres in Ellsworth, Michigan—dubbed Royal Farms—are a mix of sweet apples and the bitter varieties suited for making hard cider.
Last spring they put in a new crop of Honeycrisps, one of America’s favorite apples, only to discover an unwelcome visitor just a few weeks later: A bacterial menace known as fire blight.