KEY POINTS:
Red, ripe and crunchy, home-delivered cherries are a popular Christmas gift, but buyers are getting the pip over a shortage of the festive fruit this year.
Winter frost and heavy rain have seen growers lose up to 90 per cent of their crop - sending the price per
kilo soaring.
In New Zealand's cherry capitals, Central Otago and Marlborough, some producers said they would have nothing available until the New Year.
Crops in Hawke's Bay have also been reported to be down.
In Blenheim, one grower raised his price by 20 per cent overnight this week, from $15 to $18 a kilo.
He blamed 60mm of rain in 24 hours for ruining a good proportion of the Christmas crop, while Terry Sowman, of Kiwi Cherries also in Marlborough, said his crop was down by about half because of frost and bad pollination.
Sowman said Marlborough had "come to a big grinding halt" after this week's deluge.
"The rain splits and softens the cherries. We will be using fans, or helicopters to dry them out again."
But he said the quality was "exceptional" this year because there were fewer fruit.
Online magazine Discover Marlborough said early estimates were that crops were down by up to 90 per cent, dependent on location and variety. It said last year's crop was better because frosts didn't come at the crucial winter flowering time.
The shortage forced many companies offering online ordering and delivery to stop taking orders until New Year, and to ration the amount available to each customer.
Neville Lawson, of Scalloway Cherries in Marlborough, said he was "inundated" with pre-Christmas orders. He stopped taking them on December 5 to ensure there were enough for locals' Christmas tables.
The situation was similar at Sarita Orchard and Jackson Orchards in Central Otago. "The rain didn't help," a Jackson spokeswoman said.
She said there would be "heaps" of good-quality cherries for locals to buy at the orchard shop in time for Christmas Day, but everything was running a "little later than expected".
Many Central Otago growers were concentrating on the Chinese New Year export market, meaning fewer early cherries were available in New Zealand, she said.
The higher prices were being passed on to supermarket shoppers too.
Foodtown Online was offering a kilo of loose cherries fo $19.98 on Thursday.
New World's store in Browns Bay, Auckland was charging $24.95 a kilo.