The East Shore of Flathead Lake got power back by 4 p.m. Friday. But most everyone was outside anyway; picking up after the wind, rain, lightning and hail of Thursday night.
“They actually fared pretty good,” Nat O’Farrell, who works with orchards from Polson to Woods Bay, says of the cherry crop. O’Farrell thought maybe 1 or 2 percent of the crop was lost in the storm.
“We did have a little bit of hail,” says Heidi Johnson of The Orchard at Flathead Lake, “but the crop looks good.”
Many of the orchards further south picked most of their cherries this past week. Woods Bay and Bigfork are still bringing them in. Weather-wise, O’Farrell says he’s hoping for cool and sunny weather through harvest.