Lindsey Sterkel – Dutch Orchard
Good morning everyone! It is cherry harvest up here in Northwest Montana! 🍒
Turk and I arrived a couple of days ago and harvest was in full swing!
Mom and dad, Susan and Mark Sterkel, brought two of my cousins, Conner and Christian. My brother Nick, sister-in-law, Trish, and their little girl came up and my sister flew in! So it’s been so awesome to be in such a pretty area with a lot of our family! My grandma has a house up here, as well, and it’s right on the huge Flathead lake!
The view at the end of the orchard!
Mom, dad, my cousins and brother all live in Colorado, but come up every year to do the cherry harvest. From Mom and Dad’s house, Polson is about 900 miles…so around 15 hours.
Lambert Cherries
I always get asked about the process of how cherries get from the tree to the store, so I’ll give ya a quick run down!
Mom and dad have a big crop this year. They have about 40 people in to pick the cherries by hand. They normally travel from Washington after their cherry harvest. They follow the cherry run kind of similar to following the wheat run.
This year they’ve found a new plant to take the cherries to that is very automated. They package the cherries so they look like what you get from the store! Once I find out more about it and get to visit it I’ll tell you more about it! 😋
The pickers start around 6 in the morning. They use 12 foot ladders to pick the cherries up high and pick them all by hand. They pick into 20 or 30 pound bins. The guys will go out after a while with four-wheelers and trailers to pick up the full bins. The pickers get paid so much per bin, so they pick awfully fast.
Picking away!
Once the cherries are on the trailer they are taken to the plant or brought to the sorting room. The cherries will be poured onto “sorting tables” to get the bird pecked cherries, split cherries, leaves, etc taken out. All the clean cherries will go into a pre-made cardboard box and then put into a huge cooler and ready to be sold!
Swamping cherries from the field.
Sorting cherries
Sorting cherries and getting them ready to be sold!
These cherries are going to the plant.
Pitting pie cherries!
Mom and dad have a stand in downtown Polson, MT and also sell some from the orchard, as well. Most of the sales go to private customers and to tourists traveling through.
The cherry stand downtown in Polson, Montana.
We have a blast up here and it has always been the highlight of my summer since we were little.
It’s been awesome getting to read you ladies’ stories of harvest this year! It sounds like a rough year, but you are all HarvestHERs! Tough cookies and you’ll power through it! ❤️
1. Be ready to go at the drop of a hat...sometimes without a lunchbox.
2. Has removed the word impossible from her vocabulary!
3. Can hold a baby, take care of a toddler and drive a tractor or combine all at the same time.
4. Must be able to cook for a crew - large or small.
5. Must be able to read minds.
6. Must be able to banter with a parts man until he realizes you DO know what you're talking about.
7. Must be the entertainment director for those rainy days.
8. Be a wife, mom, friend, helper, cook, problem solver, taxi driver or extra crew hand at all times.
9. Can handle the call that makes you react, "You need what? When?" Dropping everything you're doing to make it happen.
10. At the end of the day say, "I really do love this life".
