Scottsville, N.Y. — Stokoe Farms plants several thousand trees each year that take about 8-10 years to be fully grown. Roughly ten percent of the farms’ young trees will are expected to die because of a summer drought that has plagued tree growers across the nation.
“We’ll have to re-plant those next year,” said tree grower Larry Stokoe.
It’s not just the trees planted this year but even trees planted several years ago that have suffered from a lack of water.
“A lot of this loss I don’t think is going to show up this year,” said Walter Nelson, Agriculturist for Cornell Cooperative Extension of Monroe County.
Nelson said that the ten percent reported by Stokoe is a greater loss than he estimates other farms have seen in the Rochester area.
No matter how much has been lost, Larry Stokoe says customers won’t see a change in price this year, but that may change in the future once this crop of trees reaches the age of maturity.
