Ideal growing conditions provide boost for caneberries

The plastic tunnels dotting the landscape outside Watsonville mark the emergence over the last two decades of a vibrant blackberry and raspberry business.

As recently as 1976, when apples still reigned supreme in the Pajaro Valley, there were barely 75 acres of raspberries grown outside Watsonville.

But then production increased meteorically to more than 1,500 acres by the turn of the century and more than 2,500 acres when the county agriculture commissioner tallied the total for the 2016 Santa Cruz County crop report.

"There are a lot of caneberries on both sides of the river, but the prime microclimate is on the Santa Cruz County side," said Tom AmRhein, chairman of the Watsonville-based California Strawberry Commission. "The county line goes right through the middle of the Pajaro Valley. The best climate is more inland and up on the benchlands. It's a little warmer than you'd want for strawberries. In Monterey County, it's back near Aromas."

AmRhein has grown strawberries in the Pajaro Valley since 1980, but he fortified his business around 15 years ago with the addition of caneberries.

Another advantage in growing raspberries and blackberries outside Watsonville is farmers do not have to contend with the winds that blow down the Salinas Valley from Castroville to San Lucas every afternoon, when the warm air in the center of the state rises and is replaced by the cool coastal breeze.

"The key difference from Salinas is the wind," said Mark Bolda, University of California Cooperative Extension farm advisor based in Watsonville. "The canes also need to be a little away from the coast, because they are sensitive to the wind."

The slightly warmer temperatures and shelter from the wind on the benchlands overlooking Watsonville have made for impressive harvest levels, as fields on just the Santa Cruz County side of the Pajaro River produce nearly $160 million worth of raspberries and blackberries, which is more than 40 percent of the state's entire harvest.

The landmark plastic tunnels augment the microclimate, adding a few degrees to hasten the early varieties and extend the late ones, as well as protecting the flowers and berries from the rain.

The emergence of a thriving raspberry and blackberry business outside Watsonville has come at a fortuitous time, as strawberry production may have become something of a victim of its own success.

"The strawberry deal has been challenging economically," said AmRhein. "The acreage doesn't tell the whole story, because we're producing a huge amount of strawberries on less land."

Strawberry plantings statewide peaked at a little less than 40,000 acres in 2009, and have steadily declined since to a little under 38,000 acres, and fully one-fourth of that decline has come outside Watsonville on the Santa Cruz County side of the Pajaro River, as better yields have depressed prices.

"The strawberry acreage is down because production is up per acre," Bolda said. "Around the turn of the century, we were getting 4,000 to 5,000 crates an acre. Now, you're looking at 10,000 crates an acre."

While planting is down a couple thousand acres, the strawberry harvest statewide has actually increased by around 15 percent, which has some growers looking for alternative crops.

Strawberries, raspberries and blackberries are all grown almost entirely on coastal land that comes with high leasing costs because it is in the crosshairs of urban expansion: The UC 2016 Sample Costs to Produce and Harvest Strawberries estimated farmland leases in the Monterey Bay at $2,700 an acre.

Land costs that high limit the choice of crops, and strawberries, raspberries and blackberries, at $60,000 to $70,000 an acre, are among the few that can pencil out.

Watsonville already had a rich history of blackberry production even before caneberries took up the slack as the volume of strawberry production began to depress prices.

"The Pajaro Valley had a long history of blackberries for frozen in the 1950s and 1960s," AmRhein said. "It kind of disappeared when the Willamette Valley became dominant, and came back in part because of the work the Reiters did, mostly on raspberries. A couple generations of work they did really brought it back."

AmRhein gives much of the credit for breeding and growing better raspberries and blackberries to Pajaro Valley farming pioneer Miles Reiter, CEO of Driscoll's, the berry company his grandfather Ed Reiter co-founded with R.O. Driscoll.

"Historically, the Reiter family did a lot of their work on raspberries on the Santa Cruz County side of the river," AmRhein said.

Both raspberries and blackberries enjoyed a golden age of sorts early this century as strawberries were approaching a market saturation point because of high-yielding varieties.

"Blackberries between around 2002 and 2010 were in a Goldilocks market and I think that may be over," Bolda said. "Demand was rising, and so was production. There were some good new varieties, and producers did a very good job."

While the boom times of increased caneberry production and rising prices may be over, the warmer temperatures and well-drained soils should continue to make the benchlands overlooking Watsonville ideal for raspberries and blackberries.

"Most important is the weather," said Bolda. "The temperate weather is key to producing that fruit. Our sandy soil that drains well also helps the blackberries and raspberries. They can't grow in heavy soils, and ours is a little sandier than Salinas."

(Bob Johnson is a reporter in Davis. He may be contacted at bjohn11135@aol.com.)