MELROSE, Minn. — “We bought a vineyard in 2009,” said Chad Zirbes.
Chad and Bobbi Zirbes are in their 12th season growing grapes at Moonlight Vineyard in Melrose.
But today, they’re salvaging what’s left, after winds and hail from Saturday’s storm – left behind a trail of destruction.
“We were actually moving our daughter to St. cloud yesterday, and that’s when we heard there were storms in the Melrose area,” Chad said. “All the fruit you see on the ground is from the storm, the leaves are shredded from hail damage and the fruit are busted open, it’s quite a loss."
They immediately put up a post on Facebook, asking for volunteers to help them clear up the damage.
“We put the word out on social media and text everyone and said bring all your friends and please come help, so everybody brought food and decided to help and just showed up,” Bobbi Zirbes said.
Saturday’s storm brought reports of downed trees, power outages, golf ball sized hail and other damage. Adding insult to injury for those already dealing with the aftermath of the drought.
“We spent a lot of time out here watering once a week, caring for them, because there was so much fruit out here, we didn’t want to lose them because of the drought,” Chad said.
As volunteers salvage the remaining fruit, Chad and Bobbi are looking forward to better days
“We’ll get them ready for next season, because right now, the plants are done, they’ll go dormant here pretty shortly,” Chad said.
“So the winery is going to do what they can, some of the best mistakes have come from us working with them and them working with us and we’ll see what happens,” Bobbi added.
The vineyard says they lost about 2,000-3,000 lbs. of harvest just from the storm.
They were able to find a winery to take the grapes, rather than just let them go to waste.