With California’s five-year drought breaking over the winter, the state’s strawberry harvest is running behind schedule.
Precipitation fell at record levels through February, and fields that were planted last autumn were under water at times.
Although March started off relatively dry, growers were not expecting production to reach normal levels for another several weeks, possibly until early April.
“Not only is the supply level down but fruit quality is also fairly rough right now,” Kenny Kusumoto, export sales manager for Driscoll’s, told Fruitnet. “We just need the weather to dry up for a few weeks and that will bring on some production.”
Once the winter rains abate, Oxnard in Ventura County will be the first district in California for this year’s strawberry harvest, followed by Santa Maria and then the Salinas-Watsonville area.
If the weather turns favourable across the state for an extended period, however, there is the possibility of all three areas coming into heavy production at once, resulting in a glut of fruit. If so, the California industry would need to promote heavily in advance of the Easter holiday, which falls in mid-April this year, as well as Mother’s Day in May.
According to the California Strawberry Commission (CSC), the state is expected to have 14,626ha in production this year – up slightly from the 14,585ha planted in 2016.
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