“Expect to see some lettuce out of Salinas through the end of next week,” said Mark McBride of Coastline Family Farms. “All shippers have started in Huron and will continue shipping out of there through November 14th,” McBride said. “The earliest start date I’ve heard for the Yuma, Arizona area is October 31st through November 2nd.”“We’re facing some challenging weather conditions for the near future. North and Central California are faced with rain that continues through the weekend (October 29-30th). If we get enough rain, we won’t be able to get our harvesting equipment into the fields to get the lettuce out of the fields,” McBride predicted.
“As far as fall growing conditions go, we’ve had pretty mild weather, even in the desert areas of California and Arizona. [Taking our drought into consideration], the weather has been very cooperative for our lettuce crops, compared to previous years,” McBride noted.
Coastline Family Farms, along with other produce shippers located in Salinas, opted to move their shipping hub further inland from Salinas to Huron. “Back in the day, it was common for the Salinas area to experience rain storms in October/November, and wet field conditions disrupted or delayed normal harvest schedules,” said McBride. “Since Huron is well inland and is somewhat protected from storms coming off the Pacific Ocean, it became another ‘step’ in the transition process to the desert areas in the fall.” McBride also added, “Our rainfall pattern has changed dramatically over the past 40 years, and many shippers now transition from Salinas direct to the California/Arizona desert.”
For further information:
Mark McBride
Coastline Family Farms
Tel: +1 831-755-1430