3A
THE DAILY ASTORIAN • THURSDAY, AUGUST 25, 2016
Big crop seen for surplus
plagued cranberry growers
Wisconsin
drives 2016
harvest outlook
Oregon grower delivers
irst cranberries of the year
An unusually
warm growing
season in 2015
By DON JENKINS
Capital Press
By ERIC MORTENSON
Capital Press
Cranberry farmers, already
struggling with a large inven-
tory and low prices, will pro-
duce slightly more cranber-
ries this year than in 2015, the
U.S. Department of Agricul-
ture predicted.
Growers in Wisconsin,
by far the top cranberry-pro-
ducing state, reported iso-
lated hail damage, but still
expect a better-than-average
crop because of mostly favor-
able weather, according to the
USDA’s National Agricultural
Statistics Service.
Meanwhile, Oregon and
Washington state growers are
expected to come close to last
year’s strong crops.
Overall, USDA forecasts
that growers in the ive states
with commercial cranberry
farms will harvest 8.59 mil-
lion barrels, up from 8.56
million barrels in 2015. Each
barrel equals 100 pounds of
cranberries.
Bumper crops in recent
years, including a record 8.95
million barrels in 2013, have
led to a cranberry surplus that
has hovered around 90 per-
cent of yearly global demand.
Average prices rebounded
slightly last year to $31.60 a
Don Jenkins/Capital Press
A bee pollinates cranberry bogs in May on the Long Beach
Peninsula in southwestern Washington.
barrel from $30.90 in 2014,
but remain below historic
levels.
Oregon growers last year
produced a record 562,000
barrels. The USDA forecasts
a coming harvest of 530,000
barrels, which would be the
state’s second-largest cran-
berry crop ever.
Washington
produced
198,000 barrels, just falling
short of a record yield set in
1994. The USDA forecasts
a 2016 harvest of 194,000
barrels.
The USDA predicted har-
vests will fall in Massachu-
setts and New Jersey.
Cranberry growing regions
in those states are in drought
or abnormally dry conditions,
the USDA noted.
As usual, Wisconsin
largely will dictate the size of
the U.S. crop.
The USDA forecasts the
Badger State’s cranberry
harvest will be 5.2 million
barrels, up from 4.85 mil-
lion the year before. To help
ease the surplus, the USDA
in June agreed to purchase
$27.5 million worth of cran-
berry concentrate for school
lunches and food banks.
The purchase was the equiv-
alent of 300,000 barrels,
or 30 million pounds, of
cranberries.
Oregon judge sides with state
in records dispute with Oracle
Associated Press
SALEM — An Oregon
judge has indicated that she
will throw out a software com-
pany’s claims that the state
violated its public records law
by not immediately releasing
certain emails.
The
Oregonian/Oregon
Live reported that Judge Mary
Merten James wrote Wednes-
day that Oracle is in the wrong
in the public records case. Gov.
Kate Brown spokeswoman
Kristen Grainger called the
decision a “double win” that
vindicated Brown and relected
poorly on the company.
Oregon sued Oracle in
2014, saying the company
defrauded the state by bill-
ing $240 million for a Cover
Oregon health insurance web-
site that didn’t work. That trial
begins in January.
Oracle maintains that the
website worked but the for-
mer governor chose not to use
for political reasons. The com-
pany iled its own litigation,
including the public records
dispute.
For the second year in a
row, grower Charlie Ruddell
of Bandon is claiming the
earliest delivery of cranber-
ries in North America.
Ruddell planned to deliver
the irst of 2016’s harvest
to the Ocean Spray co-op
receiving station on the Ore-
gon Coast. The delivery was
eight days earlier than 2015,
which itself was about two
weeks earlier than normal.
Ocean Spray spokes-
woman Kellyanne Dignan
conirmed Ruddell is the
co-op’s irst delivery and said
she is conident he’s the earli-
est in North America as well.
“Mother Nature’s the
boss” on harvest timing, she
said.
An unusually warm grow-
ing season in 2015 made
many crops ready for harvest
earlier than normal. Ruddell,
of Randolph Cranberries Inc.,
said other factors are at play
this year.
The variety he’s grow-
ing, Demoranville, blooms
earlier and matures faster
than other commercial vari-
eties, Ruddell said.
Secondly, Ocean Spray
Courtesy of Randolph Cranberries Inc.
A bog of cranberries, flooded and with the berries float-
ing free, stands ready for harvest in August near Ban-
don. Grower Charlie Ruddell said the harvest came in
about eight days earlier than 2015. He said the cranber-
ry variety and incentives offered by Ocean Spray are
factors in the early harvest.
is paying growers a bonus
of $2.50 per 100-pound bar-
rel for cranberries that are
lighter color than in years
past. Another $2 per barrel
bonus is available for cran-
berries delivered by Sept.
19. If a cranberry bog pro-
duces 250 barrels, that
amounts to a $1,125 bonus.
“It sets well with me,”
Ruddell said.
Dignan, the Ocean
Spray spokeswoman, said
the co-op’s desired color
standard has changed over
time. Cranberries tradition-
ally were made into juice
or sauce, which requires a
darker berry. But now most
cranberries are dried and
sweetened to make “crai-
sins,” and a lighter-colored,
earlier berry is preferable,
she said.
Wisconsin and Massa-
chusetts rank irst and sec-
ond in U.S. cranberry pro-
duction. New Jersey is third,
and Oregon and Washing-
ton state are fourth and
ifth. The U.S. usually pro-
duces between 8 million
and 9 million barrels annu-
ally. The Oregon crop is val-
ued at about $12 million per
year.
Dignan said Ocean Spray
will release updated 2016
crop projections soon. Rud-
dell said his 2015 crop was
down 5 or 6 percent from
2014, but might bounce
back this year. “My intuition
is that we will have a pretty
strong year,” he said.
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