Posts Tagged “California cherry shipments”
Here’s a glimpse of cherry shipments from around the U.S., as well as blueberry loadings from the Northwest. There also is a final outlook at late season sweet corn shipments from Georgia, and some states that will follow.
Cherry Shipments
U.S. sweet cherry production is projected to be down 6 percent this year.
About 318,000 tons are likely to ship in 2016, down from 338,000 tons in 2015, according to the June 22 Cherry Production report from the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s National Agricultural Statistics Service.
Production is down this year in both industry leader Washington and in California, which produces the second most sweet cherries, according to the report. Washington cherry shipments are now hitting a peak, while California cherry shipments are virtually finished for the year.
Washington production is expected to fall from 210,000 tons to 195,000 tons. Shipments from California, which was hit hard by spring rains, decreased from 68,000 to 60,000 tons.
Production in industry No. 3 Oregon is expected to increase from 41,000 to 42,000 tons. Michigan production also should be up, from 15,900 to 21,000 tons.
Washington cherries – grossing about $5500 to Atlanta.
Blueberry Shipments
Oregon’s 350 growers grow and ship blueberries from 11,000 acres.
Looking at 2016 production, the Beaver State is expecting to break 100 million pounds for the first time.
Washington’s 275 growers in the Evergreen State farm blueberries on 15,000 acres. The Washington blues harvest ramped up on May 30 in eastern Washington, and production started from Skagit around June 20 with shipments picking up in Whatcom a few days later.
The state’s producers are looking at production of 118 million pounds of blueberries, up from 103 million a year ago.
Sweet Corn Shipments
This is the last week of peak shipments of sweet corn out of Georgia. However, declining volume will be available until mid July.
Corn loadings then switch to Delaware in mid-July, in Ohio about July 20th and in New York about July 25th . Once Georgia finishes shipping, most of these other area are typically shipped regionally.
Southern Georgia corn, blueberries and vegetables – grossing about $3200 to Boston.
U.S. watermelon shipments continue to increase, plus an update on Salinas veggies, California cherries and almonds. Finally, did you know North Carolina ships potatoes?
Watermelon Shipments
Mexican watermelon shipments through Nogales easily leads volume in the U.S., hitting about 2,500 truck loads a week. Florida melon loadings are only about one-third this amount and Texas is even lighter.
Nogales rates on watermelons, grapes, tropical fruit ,up as much as 15% this week – grossing about $3800 to Chicago.
Salinas Valley Vegetable Shipments
It continues to be less than a steller shipping season for Salinas Valley vegetables. Various types of lettuce in particular are in a shipping gap, with low production coming out of the fields due to weather factors this spring. Vegetable shipments are not expect to show major improvements until the week of June 6th.
Salinas vegetables – grossing about $4600 to Chicago.
California Cherry Shipments
California cherry loadings will come to a screeching shortly after Memorial Day. A once promising harvest of 8 to 9 million cartons has been decimated by rains. The final total for the product is estimated at only 4.5 million cartons. This compares to 6 million cherries shipped a year ago.
If you are picking up one of the final loads of the season, use caution. Cracking or splitting are among problems being reported with the fruit. New high tech grading equipment is supposed to catch this, but caution is still urged.
Almond Shipments
California almond movement should be up 5.8 percent over last year, according to the most recent forecast. In 2016, almonds totaled 2 billion pounds. This compares to 2015’s volume of 1.89 billion pounds.
North Carolina Potatoes
The Tar Heel state doesn’t even rank in the top 10 nationally for potato loadings. However, still has about 16,000 acres of plantings, although this is down from about 2010 when it had 21,000 acres. Shipping, primarily from the Elizabeth City area, will get underway the last half of June. Shipments are destined to receivers mostly along the East Coast, with some product going to Canada. About 30 percent of the loads are for table stock, with the balance going to processors. Around 30 percent of the product is red potatoes.
California navel orange shipments are winding down for the season as loadings of Valencias are on the horizon. Meanwhile, Salinas Valley inconsistent vegetable shipments are enough to drive one nuts!
Shipments of California navel oranges from the San Joaquin Valley are is entering its home stretch, and volume is great than originally expected. Meanwhile, shipping gaps with Salinas Valley lettuce are occurring as predicted.
Orange shipments could surpass the 86 million cartons the National Agricultural Statistics Service predicted for the 2015-16 season.
As it is, an 86-million carton haul would be a more than 8 percent increase from last year’s 76 million cartons harvested. This would come with at least 2,000 fewer acres of bearing trees in the ground.
The amount of fruit that has been shipped as fresh and not diverted to juice — have consistently scored above 80 percent all season.
Shipments should continue through June.
Meanwhile, some Valencia orange shippers are beginning to pick what is expected to be a 21 million-carton crop as packing houses are shipping exports. Most shipments will begin after navels are completed. California had about 20 million cartons of Valencias last year. This was a little more than half the 39 million cartons produced in 2001-02 season.
Southern California orange shipments from grossing about $5300 to Atlanta.
Bell Pepper Shipments
Meanwhile bell pepper shipments have hit stride in the California desert from the Coachella Valley. Red, green and yellow peppers should be shipping into June, before loadings will shift to the Selma, CA area.
Lettuce Shipments
Just when really good vegetable volume should be building in the Salinas Valley, the leading items — various types of lettuce — are experiencing serious shipping gaps. The cause is weather, ranging from heat in the mid 90s, to ice on the product due to cold nights, plus winds up to 40 mph.
The only sure thing from now until we get into June, is much lighter volume than normal, plus quality issues. Just make sure you and your receiver know what’s being placed in the truck.
California Cherry Shipments
Reports are coming in from heavy rains that hit the California cherry crop a week ago. Anywhere from 20 to 50 percent of the of the remaining shipments will be knocked out.
The good news is loadings were actually up over last year in California through May 7th. Around 23 million pounds were shipped the week ending May 7th, up from 10.9 million pounds from last year in the same week.
Season-to-date, about 32 million pounds had been shipped, up from 15.5 million pounds in 2015.
California cherry shipments are expected to be finished by around May 20th.
San Joaquin Valley cherries and vegetables – grossing about $4500 to Chicago.
The Northwest United States, including British Columbia, is shaping up to be an excellent season for produce haulers to haul cherries.
With a very early start expected for Northwest cherry shipments, the prognosticators expects to ship 20.7 million 20-pound boxes this season. Initial cherry shipments from the Northwest should get underway between May 23 and May 25. A total of 200,000 boxes could be shipped in May alone.
If this estimate holds, Northwest cherry loadings would be 7 percent above last year’s 19.3 million boxes, but short of the record 23.2 million boxes shipped in 2014. Rainier cherry shipments in 2016 are expected to total 1.7 million 15-pound boxes, about the same as last year.
The total Northwest cherry industry has the potential to ship 11 million boxes in June and another 9 million in July. Good volume cherry shipments are expected to start in early June, with significant cherry volume by the week of June 15th. Peak cherry shipments are expected between the middle of June and continue through the middle of July.
Yakima Valley apple shipments – grossing about $6000 to New York City.
B.C. Cherry Shipments
British Columbia cherry shipments will start in early June. Record shipments are predicted this season with 12 million pounds being estimated. This volume would be up from the 10.5 million pounds in 2015. Most British Columbia cherry shipments are destined for markets in Western Canada and the United States.
California Cherry Shipments
California cherry shipments are now in full throttle from the San Joaquin Valley. A good, but not record crop is now being shipped and will continue for another couple of weeks.
San Joaquin Valley produce shipments- grossing about $4400 to Chicago.
California cherry shipments are just around the corner and will be followed within weeks by loadings out of the Pacific Northwest.
Shipments of California cherries should start around April 22nd from the Stockton area, with volume ramping up by end of April. Heaviest volume is expected during the first three weeks of May.
Usually, California’s peak shipments occur leading up to Memorial Day (May 30th), but this year with an earlier maturing crop, good volume is expected leading up to Mother’s Day (May 8th). This means there probably will be more cherries shipped from California this year in April than ever before, thanks in part to a couple of new early maturing cherry varieties.
Huron district head lettuce in the Central San Joaquin Valley – grossing about $4600 to Atlanta.
Washington cherry shipments are expected to be a week later than last year, around the week of June 6th. This will result in a relatively small shipping the gap between California and Washington. The gap will help both California and Washington, once they start their season. British Columbia cherry shipments are also expected to start a week later than usual, around June 20th.
Due to extra plantings coming into production this year in both Washington and Canada, initial expectations were around 30 million boxes, but this amount is expected to be lower in the wake of a recent frost. Even still, a 30% increase in tonnage is expected for Canada this year.
Washington’s Yakima Valley apples and pears – grossing about $5300 to New York City.
California cherries should provide much better loading opportunities than a year ago.
In 2014 only 3 million 18-pound boxes were shipped. However, this season volumes could reach 6 million to 7 million boxes. Compared to the near crop failure a year ago, 2015 looks a lot better, but cherry shipments will not be huge.
South of Stockton, cherry shipments should start in Bakersfield, Arvin and Shafter with the brooks variety around April 25th. The main variety, bings, should hit peak loadings May 24th to June 4th.
Barring hail damage and other adverse weather, California cherry shipment could hit 7 million packages with a stretched out season from April 20th to June 10th.
Mainly because of another warm winter and lack of chill hours, Kern County has some orchards that are very challenged to set a crop. Particularly the tulare variety looks very light in tonnage just out of the Bakersfield area. Brooks and coral champagne look better for tonnage, but there are a fair amount of doubles and spurs based on last summer’s excessive heat.
Last year’s bloom was bizarre, especially in Stockton. The pollinization timing was off, the top of the tree bloomed after the bottom. It was completely out of whack, but this year’s bloom is much more compact and uniform.
While waiting on cherry shipments to begin, here’s a couple of other more active areas for California produce shipments.
Huron head lettuce, romaine and leaf – grossing about $7200 to New York City.
Ventura County berries and vegetables – grossing about $4500 Chicago.
Washington state’s cherry growers are touting the fruit’s health benefits, including the ability to reduce the risk of arthritis, diabetes and cancer. (Next week, we’ll have a shipping out look for the state’s cherries.)
“Consuming about 45 cherries daily may significantly decrease circulating concentrations of specific inflammatory biomarkers in the blood. The findings of the study were published in the Journal of Nutrition,” According to the Yakima-based trade group Northwest Cherries.
The group cites the fruit’s high levels of fiber, potassium and melatonin, in a new campaign.
The 2014 season for Washington state cherries hasn’t started yet. In 2012, cherries ranked only behind apples as the most valuable fruit crop in Washington state.
Cherry shipments from Washington state typically peak during June and July and continue into August.
Sweet cherries are a good source of potassium, which has been shown to lower blood pressure. Studies also demonstrate that a diet includes cherries can help prevent cancer and reduce inflammation.
The best tasting and most popular variety of cherries is the bing variety, which usually comes shortly after the earlier variety rainier.
However, there are a number of other varieties, which help to extend the cherry season. Chelan and tieton cherries are early seaon offerings, while lapins, skeena and sweetheart cherries can extend the season after the bing harvest.
California cherry shipments are just getting underway and Washington state cherries follow on the heels of the California season.
California spring produce shipments are gradually building in volume as we look at Salinas vegetables and some San Joaquin Valley stone fruit. But overall, this spring and summer in California doesn’t appear to be shaping up as any barn burner when it comes to volume and loading opportunities. Between the continuing drought in the state and only moderate volume with many fruits and vegetables, I don’t see produce freight rates setting any records.
Salinas Valley vegetables have had some ups and down in volume recently due to weather, but head lettuce and other items should be significantly increasing as we get closer to May.
Broccoli and cauliflower shipments are expected to fluctuate over the next several weeks.
Meanwhile, Huron lettuce shipments from the Westside district of the San Joaquin Valley have been lighter than normal this season as the one-month spring shipping season comes to a conclusion.
California Cherry Shipments
The California cherry harvest is shaping up to be a light crop this year
California initial loadings should start around Easter in the Arvin district and peak cherry shipments should occur from mid-May into the first week of June, with product becoming available from the San Joaquin Valley further north in areas such Fresno and Reedley.
Salinas Valley vegetables – grossing about $7000 to New York City.