Have been responding to a few media enquiries about this year’s mistletoe crop.
It’s looking fairly good so far – lots of berries on the female plants, just turning fully white now. So there’ll be a lot of good quality material out there. That doesn’t mean there’s “‘lots of mistletoe” though. Just lots of berries on the mistletoe. A “bumper crop” for mistletoe usually means a good quality (e.e. well-berried) crop, not a larger amount.
And we’re getting a few stories about prices being cheap too. Which may be correct, but as the main auction markets haven’t happened yet that’s just speculation so far. But that’s the wholesale price, not the retail price. The retail price usually stays about the same, whatever the wholesale price, as profit margins on mistletoe are very small and the main costs are in transport and packaging, and those stay the same whatever the raw material price..
So if you read in a newspaper that a bumper crop means your mistletoe will be cheap this year, don’t believe it. Unless you’re a wholesaler of course…