I've noticed that really wet summers around here yield less-flavorful peaches and apples from our local orchards. I've seen some ginormous freestone yellow peaches that looked like fruit porn but tasted meh.
Had a guy growing peaches tell me that the best years turn really hot and dry in the 3 to 4 weeks before harvest - concentrates the flavor.
Suspect that's a pretty good generalization overall, that fruit does best when it's dry at the end of the season if not longer even.
My beloved
Santa Clara Valley's climate is ideal for fruit orchards as so many eastern European immigrants discovered in the late 1800's.
When I was a kid this place was still probably at least 40% orchards, primarily plums but also a good percentage of apricots and cherrys and even almonds and walnuts farther south at the Hollister end.
Silicon Valley before the transistor:
That's dated as "mid 20th century" but don't think it can be any later than early '50's and more likely late '30's
Vineyards too:
"Few traces of its agricultural past can still be found, but the Santa Clara Valley American Viticultural Area remains a large wine-making region.
It was one of the first commercial wine-producing regions in California (and possibly the United States), utilizing high-quality French varietal vines imported from France.[3][4]"
Summers generally VERY dry, normally dry from May on, if not April even.
The rainfall year used to be measured from July to July because we'd get occasional August/September thunderstorms, but the grape growers got nervous about those: the grapes could get a mold before they were at peak sugar levels. They'd literally be checking 'em every day as harvest approached.
Even after those late summer blips it stays pretty dry well into October and even November.
To tell the truth, as a kid, gardening, sometimes I kinda wished we DID get more natural rainfall.
And we had to go on water conservation in the recent drought, the reservoirs were getting pretty scary low.
