From the Fields: James Chinchiolo, ​​​​​​​San Joaquin County cherry and walnut grower

By James Chinchiolo
San Joaquin County cherry and walnut grower

We have been putting a lot of focus on maximizing tree health through sap analysis and nutritional foliar applications, and in the first year we’ve been doing this, we’re seeing an immediate health benefit in our trees. Because of the very mild summer, the health of the trees also seems to be responding to that as well. 

Our walnuts look like a nice, healthy crop in terms of volume. We typically start harvest in late September. It’s been tough in the walnut industry for the last few years, but the price is going in a positive direction. 

The cherries were on the lighter side. For growers who had cherries, it was a grower’s year because there was a lot of demand. We experienced some of the best quality cherries that we’ve ever grown, and we were rewarded well. 

With the lighter crop, I chose not to deliver as much to the traditional commercial market. Fortunately, I had fruit for our U-pick, but it was tight. There were days that we had to scramble and open up new sections to allow people to continue to pick. We did slightly increase our direct-consumer pricing. That wasn’t so much because of the supply. It was more the cost of shipping and packing materials. The commercial market received what was left over, and it wasn’t near as much as typical years.

The mission of our farming company is to allow people to develop their own intimate relationship with modern agriculture. We had a young orchard that wasn’t doing very well, so we took that portion of the orchard out and made room for a new corn maze and pumpkin patch, which opens Sept. 26. The corn is 12, 13 feet tall. We have roughly 2 acres of pumpkins. The crop looks great. This is my first time growing pumpkins, and based on the amount of people I expect to come, it looks like we will need to bring in more pumpkins.