We are sorry to have to announce that our Winter Field Day, which was to take place this Saturday, the 7th of March, is cancelled due to concerns over the Coronavirus. Several of our speakers have cancelled and other people have expressed concern. We will cover the same subjects next year. Here is a letter from our President, Bob Baines about this.
To members and fans of WWFRF – NW Fruit
I am sorry to announce that we have canceled out 2020 Winter Field Day. Coronavirus has been dominating the news for the past month, but multiple cases and several deaths in Western Washington this week have very much brought it “closer to home†Our event planners and board members have been discussing whether to cancel for several days. While public health experts have not called for a ban on public events at this time, they have asked the public to remain calm but to be cautious. Based on a vote of all of our Board of Directors we agreed to cancel the event with no objections (with one vote of “presentâ€). Several of our speakers and key event coordinators had concerns about themselves or family members being in the “most vulnerable†demographic groups and do not wish to attend. The Winter Field Day is our most important event of the years and regional fruit growers consider it one of highlights of the fruit growing education calendar, but it would be a stretch to call it essential. Without the key participants who have declined to attend this year we don’t feel that we could provide the quality experience that our guests have come to expect. Our sincere apology to anyone who has been inconvenienced by our decision.
The scionwood we have collected and prepared will be made available to other regional fruit clubs if they decide to host their typical spring fruit shows. We plan to host a fruit education event sometime this summer to make up for the lost educational and outreach opportunity. Such an event would include our annual membership meeting which we normally have during the Winter Field Day.
Our organization has been experiencing some recent growth and revitalization which you can read about in my President’s Message in our recent newsletter found on our website. I hope that we can generate some new activity this year and turn this lemon into lemonade. So please check the website regularly to see what’s happening.
Bob Baines
President
WWFRF – NW Fruit
