Massachusetts declares September Apple Month, and growers call it one of the better years: cool nights, sweet fruit, frost dodged.

Come sit, baby, and pour some cider, because western Massachusetts apple growers are having a good year. Gov. Maura Healey has declared September "Massachusetts Apple Month," the Daily Hampshire Gazette reports, as regional farmers see a fruitful start to the season. "September really is prime apple-picking season," said Ben Clark of Clarkdale Fruit Farms in Deerfield, who says the stretch from September to Indigenous Peoples Day is the best time to bring a basket to an orchard. Cool September nights brightened the colors, he said, and dry weather early in the month concentrated the sugars before the rain came. "The flavor's really good," Clark said. "They're still juicy, but they have plenty of sugars and are tasting great." At Pine Hill Orchards in Colrain, Brady Shearer describes the Honeycrisp, Cortland, McIntosh, EverCrisp, McLellan and Pink Lady on the trees as "juicy and sweet." "It's fantastic. It's one of the better years we've had," said Ervin Meluleni, who tends the trees at Coyote Hill Farm in Bernardston, a small farm with 30 trees and 30 different varieties. It's organic, and he admitted with a chuckle that its apples aren't cosmetically very nice. "Cider is the solution," he said. Clark and Ryan Voiland of Red Fire Farm in Montague say their trees dodged lasting damage from the April frost because the blossoms were still tight. About 550 Massachusetts farms grow apples on 3,786 acres, according to the USDA's most recent Census of Agriculture. And don't forget the doughnuts. Shearer's farm offers pumpkins, wagon rides through the orchard and, she says, "our famous cider doughnuts." Here's my kitchen wisdom for the season: buy your peck from the grower, and put a few of the ugly ones in the pie. They taste every bit as good. Then set an extra plate, because somebody always shows up for pie.