Late Winter Rains, Heavy Blooms Herald a Promising Season in California

After an aver­age 2022/23 crop year, pro­duc­ers in California say con­di­tions in the Golden State look promis­ing ahead of the 2023/24 har­vest.

In the pre­vi­ous crop year, California pro­duced 1.94 mil­lion gal­lons (7.34 mil­lion liters) of olive oil, the third-high­est total of the past five years and 20 per­cent below the rolling five-year aver­age.

The com­bi­na­tion of late win­ter rain and good con­di­tions dur­ing the bloom has some of the state’s largest pro­duc­ers feel­ing opti­mistic.

“Overall, the upcom­ing olive crop in California looks quite promis­ing,” Samantha Dorsey, the pres­i­dent of McEvoy Ranch, told Olive Oil Times. ​“At McEvoy Ranch, the bloom is heavy, and the trees are in very good con­di­tion to pro­duce another great har­vest this year.”

While Dorsey said the bloom had been late around the state, she added that weather con­di­tions were good for pol­li­na­tion and had not dam­aged the blos­soms.

“Our trees are bloom­ing about three weeks later than in typ­i­cal years,” Dorsey said. ​“Fortunately, the weather has been per­fect while the flow­ers have been open and pol­li­nat­ing: in the 70s (between 21 ºC and 26 ºC) with a light coastal breeze.”

“We are cer­tainly hop­ing for a con­sis­tently warm sum­mer to help the olives catch up from their late start,” she added. ​“The sum­mer weather will deter­mine if we har­vest dur­ing our nor­mal win­dow in November or if the late bloom will push har­vest into December.”

Andrew Sciabica of Sciabica Family Olive Oil, which has been pro­duc­ing olive oil in California since 1936, told Olive Oil Times that he also sees signs of a large har­vest after a boun­ti­ful bloom.

“The bloom is a very cru­cial point in deter­min­ing the qual­ity of the crop,” he said. ​“During that time, we did not face adverse weather such as freezes, heavy rain and hot winds, so the crop has set well.”

Emma Koefoed, a mar­ket­ing asso­ciate at Cobram Estate in Woodland, California, echoed these sen­ti­ments.

“Like many farm­ers in the val­ley, we observed a delay in flow­er­ing this year,” she told Olive Oil Times. ​“However, we are pleased to report a note­wor­thy bloom through­out the groves, sig­ni­fy­ing a promis­ing poten­tial for har­vest.”

“The favor­able pol­li­na­tion con­di­tions also played a vital role in fos­ter­ing healthy crop devel­op­ment,” she added. ​“As we con­tinue to mon­i­tor and eval­u­ate the groves, we remain opti­mistic.”

The healthy crop devel­op­ment for Cobram Estate, for­merly known as Boundary Bend, comes despite frost dam­age expe­ri­enced in the groves last year.

“The groves con­tinue to exhibit remark­able resilience by direct­ing their energy towards new growth to sup­port this year’s crop,” Koefoed said. ​“It is impor­tant to note olive trees nat­u­rally main­tain vari­able fruit pro­duc­tion, fol­low­ing an alter­nate bear­ing cycle. A poor year is often trailed by a stronger one as trees regain vigor and repro­duc­tive capac­ity.”

While spring rains pro­vided some relief from the long-term drought that has dom­i­nated California, the erratic weather may have affected some groves more than oth­ers across the state.

”The boun­ti­ful rains have fully charged the soil pro­file, so we are enter­ing the sea­son with all our reser­voirs at capac­ity,” Dorsey said. ​“This means our sur­face reser­voirs (ponds) that catch rain and runoff for sum­mer irri­ga­tion are full, and our soil, which is our largest reser­voir for water on the ranch, is at hold­ing capac­ity, too.”

Full sur­face ponds came as a stark con­trast to the sit­u­a­tion in the sum­mer of 2021 when Dorsey told Olive Oil Times the farm was short about 22 mil­lion gal­lons (83 mil­lion liters) of water.

“Entering the spring with full ponds and moist soil feels like an enor­mous relief after so many years of drought,” she said.

However, Sciabica said that cool and wet weather run­ning into March had delayed the crop but not caused any major incon­ve­niences.

“The bloom is a very cru­cial point in deter­min­ing the qual­ity of the crop,” he said. ​“During that time, we did not face adverse weather such as freezes, heavy rain, and hot winds, so the crop has set well.”

Koefoed echoed the sen­ti­ment. ​“While the wet win­ter and cool tem­per­a­tures expe­ri­enced dur­ing the early spring did delay the trees from ​‘wak­ing up,’ the extended period of rain and unex­pected snow­fall caused lit­tle dis­rup­tion com­pared to last year as the trees were already in a state of dor­mancy.”

“As tem­per­a­tures grad­u­ally warm and the soil mois­ture sta­bi­lizes, the trees will respond by enter­ing an active growth phase, which includes the devel­op­ment of leaves, shoots and the for­ma­tion of flower buds,” she added.

As this phase devel­ops, the field team at Cobram Estate will spend the rest of the year pro­vid­ing the right nutri­ents and fer­til­izer to the trees to ensure max­i­mum fruit pro­duc­tion.

Despite the real­ity that farm­ers do not con­trol the weather, fruit flies or equip­ment sna­fus, California pro­duc­ers feel sev­eral things could cre­ate ideal har­vest con­di­tions.

“An ideal sum­mer would entail: lots of mild and warm weather, a lit­tle morn­ing fog most days, a mirac­u­lous drop in olive fruit fly pop­u­la­tions, and no bro­ken irri­ga­tion pumps all year,” Dorsey said. ​“Plus, tons of cus­tomers buy­ing olive oil to free up tank space for this fall’s har­vest.”

Sciabica con­firmed: ​“We should see a good har­vest if the trees receive proper water­ing and nutri­tion.”

However, Koefoed warned that late flow­er­ing decreased the time for oil accu­mu­la­tion before the start of the har­vest.

“To ensure a suc­cess­ful har­vest, our pri­mary focus will be to keep the olive trees in opti­mal con­di­tion by pro­vid­ing them with the nec­es­sary resources and care to carry out their vital func­tions,” she said. ​“This pri­mar­ily involves deliv­er­ing ade­quate water and nutri­tion to sup­port their growth and oil pro­duc­tion.”

Overall, irri­ga­tion, nutri­tion and care are three keys to a suc­cess­ful har­vest.

“One cru­cial aspect of main­tain­ing tree health and pro­mot­ing oil accu­mu­la­tion is ensur­ing the trees receive suf­fi­cient water,” Koefoed said. ​“Adequate irri­ga­tion is vital, espe­cially dur­ing peri­ods of increased heat or dry spells.”

Custom irri­ga­tion sched­ules for each grove pre­vent water stress in the trees allow­ing them to use their energy for oil accu­mu­la­tion.

“Nutrition also plays a crit­i­cal role in the devel­op­ment of a fruit­ful har­vest,” Koefoed said. ​“We strive to imple­ment a bal­anced fer­til­iza­tion pro­gram tailed to the spe­cific nutri­ent require­ments of the olive trees, con­tribut­ing to opti­mal growth, flower devel­op­ment and ulti­mately, oil accu­mu­la­tion.”

She added that Cobram Estate fre­quently tests the soil and uses satel­lite analy­sis to deter­mine where nutri­ents are needed in the company’s best groves.

“We mon­i­tor and mit­i­gate any sources of stress which can impede oil accu­mu­la­tion,” Koefoed said. ​“This includes extremely high tem­per­a­tures, pests, dis­eases or inad­e­quate ven­ti­la­tion which can adversely affect the trees’ pro­duc­tiv­ity.”