There is a strong sense of optimism going into this year's California cherry season. "I am about as excited as I have been going into a cherry season in the 20 plus years I've been doing this," says Joe Cataldo of J&M Farms and Delta Packing Co.
© J&M Farms/Delta Packing Co.
The season will start between 10 days to two weeks earlier than normal thanks to much warmer than average weather through March. "That accelerated the crop pretty significantly and because of that, we're expecting to have promotable high quality fruit hitting the market extremely early, starting in probably the third week of April," he says. Some early districts could even start around April 20th with peak volume starting around May 8th for seven to 10 days after that.
This follows an aggressive early bloom on some early varieties. On some of the later varieties though, the crop set is a bit more spotty although still plentiful. "It's just not the ideal crop set because of the bloom that we went through," says Cataldo. However, overall the crop still looks better than it has in the last few seasons.
Promotable fruit for holidays
With a large crop of strong quality fruit, the timing works out well in that it should provide ample volume not just for Memorial Day promotions but for other holidays such as Mother's Day.
© J&M Farms/Delta Packing Co.
It also sets up a longer than normal marketing window for California cherries. "We're especially excited to feature some of the industry's earliest cherries and we'll be finishing strong with the latest fruit of the California season. We will have ample enough of marketable, very promotable fruit carrying into the extremely important Memorial Day pull," says Cataldo, adding that the season will also lead into the Northwest cherry season with little anticipated overlap.
On varieties, the company is working with early varieties that may even start around April 14th. It will start the season with proprietary Bloom Fresh International varieties such as Cupid and Crunch to start the season, and then move into Royal varieties. By May, it will begin with Coral cherry varieties. "In between those will be some Santina varieties extremely early–I might be picking my Santinas April 28th, which is about 10 days to two weeks earlier than I've ever harvested Santinas," says Cataldo. "Then we'll go through Black Pearls, Chelans and some Rainier production in between all that. We'll finish off the year strong with the Bing and Lapin varieties. It's shaping up to be a well flowed, calendar-style harvest. Having 15 days in April of good production really is going to get us going on the right foot."
For more information:
Joe Cataldo
J&M Farms/Delta Packing
Tel: +1 (209) 334-1023
[email protected]
https://www.deltapacking.com/
