Hail Netting
Crop Saver™ Multi-Net™ blocks hail to keep crops safe inside. Perfect to protect vineyards, berry patches, vegetable garden and other crops. Annual hail damage to fruit crops costs US & Canadian farmers millions of dollars annually. That's the bad news. The good news is hail damage can be prevented with hail protection net crop covers.
Hail netting can be installed on hoops, arches and other frames to support netting above the crop plants - see image to the right. Hail protection netting can also be draped directly on grape vines, blueberry bushes, fruit trees and vegetable row crops - see image below. It's important to note that even though big hail stones make the news, even tiny hail diameters can inflict severe but initially hard-to-detect damage to fruit, flowers, leaf buds that may be in their early development.
Why Cover Your Crops
Hail causes a variety damage impacts. The first, referred to as "direct damage," involves immediate impacts to fruit and plants. Damage to fruit can take a variety of forms and is often the focus immediately following a storm event. Damage can includefruit shredding where skins are sliced open (open wounds), fruit bruising (closed wounds) and stripping fruit from stems. While fruit damage is often the focus after a storm, direct damage also causes injury to and loss of limbs, buds, leaves, tender stems & twig tissue.
A second hail damage impact is referred to "secondary" damage. Secondary hail damage involves consequences that occur over time after the storm has passed. This type of damage can involve infection from pathogens like twig canker fungi and bacterial and fungal agents that can cause soft rot that attacks fruit. Secondary damage and resulting wound injuries can take days, even weeks, to manifest but can completely ruin a crop. In many cases, damaged fruits will mature with surface blemishes and malformations that make them unsaleable in raw form.
It's no secret that fruit takes a beating from hail damage, but the impacts go beyond the loss as tonnage value. If your operation depends upon "estate-grown" fruit for finished products like wine and other food, a single storm can wipe out a harvest and a season on the shelf. Lost harvests also mean lost jobs and income for those who depend upon these activities. All together, hail crop damage has far-reaching impacts from the field to the community. Crop Saver Multi-Net is the hail protection netting that gets the job done when hail starts falling. Protect your crop and don't miss a season.
