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Agriculture

Sunday, May. 10, 2009

Crops, prices are good, even with late rain and early heat

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Neither drought nor cold snaps nor an April heat wave can keep fruits and vegetables out of the stores.

The main season for California's fresh produce is off to a promising start, with adequate supplies of most crops from the San Joaquin Valley and other regions.

That likely will mean reasonable prices for consumers. Last week, strawberries were selling for $1.50 a pound and sweet corn was 33 cents an ear at several stores in the Modesto area.

The drought has hit hard at many growers in the western and southern parts of the valley, where state and federal water was sharply cut to protect fish in the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta.

In much of the state, late storms and secure water rights have kept production up. Spring brought a heat spike and a few cold and rainy spells but with relatively little damage.

"It looks like we've got a fairly normal crop at this point," said Bill Ferreira, president of the Apricot Producers of California, based in Turlock.

The fresh apricot season is starting a little slowly this month because of south valley chill damage, he said. The main part of the harvest, much of it from Stanislaus County, is from early June to mid-July.

The cherry harvest also started slowly because of south valley rain damage, but it looks to be strong overall, said Jim Culbertson, executive manager of the California Cherry Advisory Board in Lodi.

"Rain on cherries cracks them, so we got a little bit of damage from the rain we had," he said.

In and near San Joaquin County, the main area for cherries, the fruit survived the rain because it hadn't ripened, he said.

The peak cherry season will start late this month and run through June.

Fresh peaches, nectarines and plums are hitting the stores this month, mostly from the south valley, but some from the Modesto area.

Total volume for the three fruits is expected to be down 14 percent from last year's bumper crop but close to average for recent years, according to the California Tree Fruit Agreement, a trade group based in Fresno County. Harvests of these fruits go throughout the summer.

Blueberries, an emerging spring crop in California, are starting their two-month run in the stores.

"They're just starting to swell up and develop color, so it's just a matter of time before we can start picking them," said Rogelio Martinez, who grows blueberries on 3 acres near Knights Ferry.

He said he might have his first berries at the Modesto Certified Farmers Market on Thursday.

Here are the outlooks for a few other crops from the National Agricultural Statistics Service:

Strawberries: The state's crop is expected to be up 4 percent from last year. The berries are picked all year, but they peak in spring because all the growing regions, including the valley, are producing.

Sweet corn: The Imperial Valley crop is in stores and more will follow. Acreage is the same as last year.

Head lettuce: Acreage is down about 6 percent as some growers deal with water shortages.

Tomatoes: Recent rain boosted the crop. Acreage is stable.

Melons: Canteloupe acreage is unchanged from last year, but watermelons are down 13 percent.

Bee staff writer John Holland can be reached at jholland@modbee.com or 578-2385.