Mike Hirakata heard the pounding on his roof and counted the hours until morning. As the sun rose, the Arkansas Valley melon farmer’s heart sank as he saw the battle a rare nighttime hailstorm had raged on his tender crops.

“The vines were beaten into the ground,” said Hirakata. “It’s a lot of work out the door.”

That July 9 storm was the start of a month-long patchwork of hail which tortured cantaloupe farmers in agriculture-rich Otero County. The hail, coupled with a planting delay because of spring rains, and brutal heat when they didn’t want it, means the Front Range customers who salivate all year for the trademark Rocky Ford cantaloupe may have to wait until September for their first juicy bite. 

“It’s the worst year I can remember in 33 years,” said Hirakata. The 4^th generation farmer and president of the Rocky Ford Grower’s Association has tried to manipulate Mother Nature to make up the difference by planting at intervals. But so far, he has lost 60% of his 2023 crop. 

Jerre Hirakata, 84, saw his son’s 33-years and raised it.

“Heck no! We’ve been packing cantaloupe for 54 years and I’ve never seen it like this!” he said. 

Gail Knapp, co-owner of Rocky Ford’s Knapp Farms LLC, said that her 2023 cantaloupe output was also dismal. Her acreage has only produced enough cantaloupe to sell at the family’s fruit stand with some leftover for various farmer’s markets.

“Our production is a tenth of what it should normally be if the plants were healthy and undamaged,” said Knapp, who lost 30-40 acres to the hail. That computes to roughly around 105,000-140,000 melons.

She said this summer’s barrage of ping pong ball-sized ice missiles split the melons in half. 

The melon situation is so bad, grocery stores don’t seem to want to talk about it.

Contacted by The Denver Gazette, Sprouts, Safeway and Natural Grocers did not return a request for comment, but front range produce warehouse managers said off-the-record that no one has been able to give them a set target date for the cantaloupe’s arrival.

King Soopers’ spokesperson Jessica Trowbridge told The Denver Gazette that the grocery stores carry more than 80 different varieties of Colorado-grown produce, and “we are starting to see more Rocky Ford melons hit our shelves every day.” But she did not specify the type of melon. 

Hirakata confirmed that their farms have sent truckloads of mini watermelons, but not cantaloupe, and that prices would likely increase because of the shortage. 

Customers who count the summer months by when Rocky Ford melons show up on the store shelves are bummed.

“If cantaloupe doesn’t come from Rocky Ford, I don’t bother buying it,” said David Pellegrino, who had just loaded up on groceries, sans cantaloupe. “It’s a Colorado staple the way the Palisade peaches are.” 

The latest numbers from the 2017 Ag Census showed that 109 cantaloupe producers in Colorado produced 577 acres of cantaloupe.

Tom Lipetzky, director of Marketing Programs & Strategic Initiatives for the Colorado Department of Agriculture, crunched the numbers for The Denver Gazette based on the 2017 census and deduced that the economic impact to the state from merely the production of cantaloupe is $6.6 million. But he noted that this number didn’t account for the money generated from things like farm-stand sales, sorting, washing and packing. When it’s all said and done, Lipetzky surmised: “If I had to ballpark an economic impact, I’d say it’s somewhere in the range of $15-20 million.”

Since 1887, Colorado’s melon production has centered in the Arkansas Valley — producing some of the highest quality commercial cantaloupe in the U.S. The hot days and cool nights along the Arkansas River stimulate the sugars in the melons, Knapp said, and earned Rocky Ford the nickname “Sweet Melon Capital.” 

The U.S. Market Report confirmed that the cantaloupe market is down this week with much of the country’s supply coming out of California. But the rain and irregular planting there contributed to what has become a national shortage of the sweet, orange-colored melon with the tightly netted rough rind.

Cantaloupe is not the only fruit in high demand due to shortages. A January freeze, hurricane winds and disease hit Florida’s orange trees, all contributing to what the Florida Department of Citrus reported was a 60% decline in production.

The squeeze in melon production isn’t all bad.

Watermelon and honeydew survived the hail in southeastern Colorado better than the cantaloupe. At last weekend’s Arkansas Valley Fair, the town gave out a free watermelon to anyone who showed up for Watermelon Day.

“They were a little smaller than usual, but people stood in line in the hot sun for hours and we gave out 22,000 pounds,” Fair Manager Sally Cope said.

Vegetable lovers can find plenty of fresh tomatoes, beans and sweet corn can be found, according to Knapp.

Hirakata said he wished he was out picking ripe cantaloupe like he usually is in mid-August but said: “We’re pretty busy for not having much to do.”  

He had plenty to do in his fields Wednesday afternoon picking personal-sized watermelon, which is already on the shelves in Denver and Colorado Springs stores.

“There’s a lot of freedom in farming because you’re out in the open, but you’re also at the mercy of the weather,” he said. “You’ve got to take the good with the bad.”