The California table grape season is estimated to have about three weeks of harvest left with a finish date around November 20th. Shipments are expected to continue for another five weeks. Currently, the industry is still moving pretty big volumes, averaging four million boxes per week. "The market is very active and firming up during the final part of the season," says Nick Dulcich with Pretty Lady Vineyards. "Demand ranges from good to very good and we're hoping to have enough fruit to satisfy the needs of our customers in the weeks to come," he added. The availability of green grapes in particular is becoming tighter. "I expect supply of green grapes to be short by November 10 – 15."
Less competition
What is driving the demand? This time of year, many domestic fruits are out of season, resulting in less competition for grapes. On top of that, strawberries have been affected by recent rains. "These factors combined really drive the demand for grapes." As a result, retailers are running ads, and the momentum is good. "We are excited about this strong finish to the season." While the East Coast tends to shift to imports from Peru early December, the West Coast and Midwest will stay with California grapes until supply runs out. "My expectation is for the grape market to be fully in Peru's hands by Christmas," said Dulcich.
Up until now, 60 million boxes of California table grapes have been shipped according to the USDA and the California Table Grape Commission. The same time last year and the year before, these numbers amounted to 63.7 million and 52.3 million boxes respectively. Dulcich estimates 75 percent of the crop has been shipped by now and another 20 million boxes are left to be picked. While California's initial total production volume estimate amounted to 106 million boxes, recent rains did have an impact on production. "It will be interesting to see where the industry ends up in terms of volume," Dulcich mentioned.
© Pretty Lady Vineyards
Left: Autumncrisp® grapes. Right: coverage to protect grapes from rain.
Small rain events
While quality is still good, it can't be taken for granted this time of year. Grapes are very sensitive to rain and a small rain event up in the northern growing region around Tulare, Visalia, and Fresno affected the crop. Most growers had covered their vineyards with plastic prior to this rain event. While this sounds positive, the rain came relatively early in the season and temperatures were still quite high at the time. "Unfortunately, plastic coverage in combination with high temperatures doesn't create ideal growing conditions for the fruit."
Another small rain event in the southern growing region between Delano and McFarland also impacted the crop as many growers in the area hadn't covered their grapes yet. "It slowed down harvest, increased costs for cleaning, and decreased volume," Dulcich commented. These smaller rain events were just a start and were followed by heavy rains on October 6 that dropped two to three inches of water on the vineyards. Some growers may have lost a significant part of their crop on that day. "We were fortunate to have our vineyards fully covered in plastic just hours before the rain came," shared Dulcich.
Plastic coverage
In preparation for the heavy rain, about 800 to 1,000 people were busy manually covering Pretty Lady's vineyards. "We've been covering our orchards for about 20 years and while it is very time consuming and expensive, the alternative of losing part of the crop is a lot worse." Dulcich estimates the cost of covering the vineyards in plastic at about $1,000/acre and with a total of 1,500 acres covered, the total cost to protect all ranches against the rain is about $1.5 million." The covers will be left on the vines until the end of the season as temperatures are low enough for the fruit not to be negatively impacted by the plastic.
© Pretty Lady Vineyards
1,500 acres of vineyards have been covered to protect grapes against rain events.
For more information:
Nick Prosper Dulcich
Pretty Lady Vineyards
Tel: (+1) 661-792-6360
[email protected]
www.dulcich.com
