Late frost pushes back New Brunswick strawberry season
Strawberry growers in New Brunswick say May frosts and cold, damp weather have delayed U-pick openings by roughly a week to 10 days, while irrigation protected some fields from much heavier crop losses.
Strawberry growers in New Brunswick are entering the 2026 season with a clear delay after late spring frost and several weeks of cold, damp weather slowed crop development across parts of the province. CBC reported that many U-pick farms expect to open roughly a week to 10 days later than normal. For farms that depend on a short harvest window and direct customer traffic, that kind of delay immediately affects labour planning, field access and early-season revenue.
Laurie McLellan, who has grown strawberries for about a decade in Belleville, roughly 10 kilometres from Woodstock, said this spring was one of the hardest she has managed. Her family spent multiple near-freezing nights in May monitoring the crop and running irrigation whenever temperatures dropped close to zero. The water formed a protective layer of ice around the blossoms, insulating them from more severe injury. McLellan said that irrigation was the difference between having a crop and losing it. Her farm opened U-pick on June 21 last year, slightly ahead of its June 24 target, but in 2026 she does not expect pickers into the rows until around July 1.
Frost damage is not always obvious from the outside. Growers say the clearest sign often appears inside the blossom: when the centre turns black, that flower will not produce fruit. McLellan said frost can damage a whole area of a field depending on its location, not just isolated plants. That is why growers are reluctant to announce an opening date too early. Customers need more than scattered ripe berries; they need enough volume in the field to make a commercial U-pick day worthwhile.
Madeleine Cere of Les Petits Fruits de Pre d'en Haut in Memramcook described a similar setback. Two nights below zero destroyed the first blooms on her early strawberry varieties, although later varieties were mostly spared. She also expects to open about 10 days later than usual. The weather pressure is not limited to strawberries. Cere said last year's drought hurt her blueberry crop because shallow-rooted plants struggled through the dry period and some bushes produced no flowers at all this spring, leaving the farm to expect a smaller blueberry harvest in 2026.
The production challenge is being compounded by tighter margins. Cere pointed to rising fuel, fertilizer and labour costs as expenses that keep climbing even when weather cuts output. For berry farms in New Brunswick, the story is no longer just about a late harvest; it is about climate volatility and higher input costs arriving at the same time. Growers are continuing to monitor their fields day by day and say the final opening dates will depend not on the calendar, but on when enough ripe fruit is actually ready for customers.