After two seasons with heavy production, California's cherry crop will be down significantly this season. Last year, the industry shipped 9.5 million boxes, and many late orchards were left unharvested due to market conditions. "This year, we expect the industry to be around 50 percent of that number," says Justin Bloss with Rivermaid Trading Company. "It is a large adjustment after two very robust crop years in 2023 and 2024," he added. The two predominant varieties, Coral and Bing, both have much lighter fruit sets. While the trees may need to reset after two heavy production years, a warm winter and lack of adequate chill hours have resulted in most southern orchards to be considered crop failures. Northern California orchards fared a little bit better, but production is still spotty. Above average post-harvest temperatures in 2024 have caused above average spur and doubles, resulting in more off-grade cherries this year.
Rivermaid started packing the earliest varieties in the last week of April and volume continues to build up. "We will hit our shipping peak around May 24 when we expect a modest bump to this season's volume," Bloss said. In the past few weeks, the weather has been favorable. "We've dodged a couple of bullets with rain that never materialized or rain that had a minimal impact." Temperatures have been fairly consistent and moderate for the past couple of weeks. As of right now, the weather forecast looks supportive. "We're always on the lookout for rain events, but so far, so good." With less cherries on the trees, Rivermaid is expecting very good sizing as well as high brix levels and great flavor.
As a result of lower volume, demand is exceeding supply, which will likely continue to be the case until the season wraps up. The large majority of Rivermaid's cherries make their way into the domestic market with the balance being exported to much of Asia, Australia, and Canada. Shipments are expected to finish around June 10, right after Washington's cherry season kicks off. "We anticipate minimal overlap with the northwest growing regions this year," commented Bloss.
For more information:
Justin Bloss
Rivermaid Trading
Tel: (+1) 209-210-6829
[email protected]
www.rivermaid.com