A LATE-season surge has growers smiling at greatly increased prices for apples and pears.

High-quality pink lady apples have been fetching $48 a case, or $4 a kilogram, while packham pears are fetching about $36 a case, or $3/kg.

Just five weeks ago the pears were worth only $1.80/kg to growers.

Apple and Pear Australia general manager Tony Russell said growers had "done alright lately".

"Prices have been quite excellent for growers really," Mr Russell said.

He said stocks of apples and pears - which were actually harvested early this year, as apples and pears keep so well - were starting to "get pretty tight" as the crop ran out.

Ardmona grower Andrew Plunkett said apple and pear sales had been assisted by a lack of the usual volumes of other fruit.

"It seems stone fruit and mangoes haven't gotten cheap (as happens when high volumes flood the market), mangoes are struggling and stone fruit hasn't come on in big volumes early," Mr Plunkett said.

However, Mr Plunkett said many growers had sold much of their apple and pear stocks earlier and now had little left to sell for the higher price.

"We went hard early, now we're wishing we had more," Mr Plunkett said.

"It's difficult, you're growing apples and pears and you have to know what's going on with the mango crop . . . how could you tell mangoes were going to be light and late in northern Queensland?"

However, the $48 a case currently being paid for pink lady apples would make growers "very happy", he said.

Meanwhile, Mr Russell said problems involving eucalyptus weevils invading apple crops from neighbouring bluegum plantations in Western Australia were likely to be localised.

The weevil had been detected in apple exports to the UK and caused treatment to be used on the fruit, which greatly devalued it.

This was despite the fact the weevil has no affect on the fruit.

"That (high pest numbers) can happen in any cropping-type monoculture situation (like bluegums)," Mr Russell said.

 

*This news is a quote from the「WeeklyTimesNow」.