I’m pleased to announce that Good Fruit Grower has launched a Spanish language website, goodfruit.com/es. There you’ll find translations of articles from past issues, new essays by researchers and others and videos of horticulture experts. All in Spanish.

The Spanish site follows months of discussion and collaboration with growers, researchers and others who helped guide this project. The project flows from our mission of providing educational information to growers and responds to an obvious need. Look at attendance at Spanish-language sessions at any industry meeting: The overflow crowd proves a need for quality horticultural information and industry news in Spanish. Who best can fulfill that need than this magazine?

O. Casey Corr, Managing Editor Good Fruit Grower

O. Casey Corr

In recent years, the staff at Good Fruit Grower has developed new ways to make our content accessible and immediate. We launched accounts with Twitter, YouTube, Facebook and Instagram. We improved our popular eFlash newsletter for weekly delivery of news and information. We developed an app for quicker display on mobile devices. We engineered our website to improve its “searchability” and speed. Now we’re taking another step. We’re ensuring that Good Fruit Grower’s essential information reaches every stakeholder, from field representatives to growers, for whom Spanish is their first language.

The project has been a goal of mine since I joined the magazine in 2013. I thought that we were not completely fulfilling our mission as a grower-owned publication unless we fully engaged and served a vital community in our industry.

Launching the site took time and resources, which is why I’m grateful to Audience Development Manager Maria Fernandez, project lead; to Senior Editor Shannon Dininny, who oversaw development of editorial content; to Digital Producer TJ Mullinax for building a terrific website; and to our Spanish-language sponsors, especially G.S. Long Co., whose support helps offset added cost of translation and editing. Initially, we are posting at least three new articles timed with each of our 17 issues per year. As we smooth our processes, and if we secure additional resources, we hope to increase the number and frequency of Spanish articles.

We wanted our Spanish content to reflect the same high standards that we bring to our English content. For that reason, we looked for professionals with experience translating technical, horticultural topics; who are familiar with our intended audience; and who had good judgment for situations where certain English terms did not exactly transfer into formal Spanish.

We’ve had tremendous support for this project from the outset, especially from the Washington State Fruit Commission, owner of this magazine, and Commission President B.J. Thurlby. We’ve had constant guidance and support from the advisory board we formed for this project. My thanks go to all of the advisers: Ofelio Borges, Washington State Department of Agriculture; Victor Bueno, Washington Fruit and Produce Co.; Michael Gempler, Washington Growers League; Gwen Hoheisel, Washington State University; Karen Lewis, Washington State University; Frank Lyall, Yakima County Farm Bureau; Vicente Medelez, Opportunities Industrialization Center of Washington; Louisa Mora, Opportunities Industrialization Center of Washington; Jacqui Gordon Nunez, Washington State Tree Fruit Association; Jamie Ramon, Washington State Department of Agriculture; Mario Miranda Sazo, Cornell University; and Flor Servin, Washington State Department of Labor & Industries. Each of them made this project better.

Additional thanks go to our translators, Alicia Cardenas of ACS Translation Services and Pablo Pamlandez of the University of Washington.

We hope the grower community responds well to the Spanish site. Please help spread the word about this new resource by sharing with others a link to the site. If you want a Spanish language flier for the site, let me know.

With this, as with all our efforts, we appreciate your feedback and suggestions for improvements. As employees of a grower-owned publication, we work for you. You can contact me at casey.corr@goodfruit.com. Spanish speakers can contact Maria Fernandez at maria@goodfruit.com.

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My congratulations to Good Fruit Grower’s 2016 Growers of the Year, the father and son team of Bill and Mark Zirkle, who were selected by our magazine advisory board. The Zirkles are prominent leaders and innovators in our industry, who are profiled in this issue by Senior Editor Shannon Dininny and Photojournalist TJ Mullinax. The Zirkles will receive the award later this month in Wenatchee at the annual meeting of the Washington State Tree Fruit Association.

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Good news for those attending the hort show in Wenatchee: Good Fruit Grower is again teaming up with our friends at Wilbur-Ellis for a drawing to win a John Deere Gator. You can get entry forms at the Wilbur-Ellis booth or at our booth. We had a lot of fun doing this last year, when the winner was Scott Jacky, manager of orchard operations for Valley Fruit in Wapato, Washington. There’s a video of him zooming around in the parking lot on our Facebook page. •

O. Casey Corr is managing editor of Good Fruit Grower.