4th Quarter 2010 Grove Update

It is hard to believe it is Fall already, and some nice cool weather has come along with it. Now that the weather has cooled off, the disease pressure from the summer has eased off a lot and the citrus fruit has begun to change color. In the last week of November or the first week December we will start picking our earliest juice fruit, and will be in full swing with our Early/Mid oranges by the end of December (or close to it). We will pick those E/M’s until about mid to late March. If all goes well and we don’t have an extreme cold winter like we had last season, between February and March we will pick all of the Murcotts (fresh tangerines). Then in late March or April we will start picking the Valencias and we will pick those until mid June. So in short, the citrus division will be in full swing harvesting fruit from late November until the middle of June.

The ground is starting to get a little dry so hopefully we will get some periodic rain through the winter. We would like to think that the coming winter will be a little easier on us, but as everybody knows, it is tough making those kinds of predictions.

Steve John
Citrus Production Manager
SMR Farms, LLC