It’s been a focused week at Pine Island Cranberry as our teams finish the planting at the Oswego renovation and work on the annual tasks of removing the winter flood and preparing for frost.

We’ve said it so often you can probably recite it with us by now: good water management is absolutely critical to growing cranberries. Growers rely on a clean, abundant supply to maintain the bogs year round. The key question, as everyone here knows by heart, is “Where is the water coming from, and where do you want it to go?” For every acre of vines, cranberries require ten acres of water. Therefore it is another one of Pine Island’s top priorities to make sure our surrounding environment is as protected as possible. As we said last year about removing the winter flood, good water management is not only the crucial part of our work here at Pine Island – it’s essential to the balance of agriculture production with the Pinelands environment.

The Cohansey-Kirkwood aquifers lie beneath the surface of the Pinelands, containing enough water to cover the state of New Jersey six feet deep. Most of the water in the aquifer comes from rain, which also helps fill our reservoirs. When we flood the bogs for the winter, we direct the surface water (using damns, canals, and ditches) to the bogs at the highest elevations. Gravity causes water to flow downhill, so, once the bogs at higher elevations are flooded, we can easily direct it downhill to bogs at the lower levels.

When the warmer weather sets in, the bogs are drained so that the dormant vines awaken for the growing season; while cranberries are most frequently harvested using the “wet pick” method, they do not actually grow under water and thus need to go through the same growing cycle as any other fruit crop. The process, which we call “dumping water”, is deceptively simple: a team member takes a gate hook and removes the boards that have been placed across the gate in the bog. (The boards are removed in a specific pattern to work with gravity and the natural flow of the water.) Once the boards have been pulled and placed on top of the gate, the water moves to the next bog along the ditches. This water returns to the reservoirs and canals in order to be reused for the next part of the cycle. Our team has targeted April 25th to be the end date for this.

The next stage will be frost protection. Typically, a cranberry bog is built at a lower level than the land immediately surrounding it and the bog temperature can drop ten to fifteen degrees lower than the uplands. These conditions make monitoring bog temperature a top priority once the winter water comes off, which is why installing sprinklers quickly and efficiently is so important. Right now our team is doing whatever it takes to get them all installed before the temperature drops at night.

Ultimately, it is our Pine Island team’s dedication to our land and our surrounding environment that makes us what we are: growers dedicated to doing what we do better every day.

Pine Island’s 20-Mile March continues. Our 2013 growing season targets are in place: grow 330,000 barrels of cranberries with a 260 barrels per acre average. (As general manager Fred Torres likes to say, “If you don’t set targets, you don’t get things done.”) We adapted and met our sanding targets last month, and now we have set our sights on spring planting, removing the winter flood, and installing the remaining sprinklers.

Our first priority is spring planting. Last week, planting supervisor Kylie Naylor explained how she set our targets: based on our fall average numbers, she set up a spreadsheet to calculate how many plants we would need over how many acres in order set targets for both number of trays per day and number of acres planted per day. Advances in technology have also changed our planting goals: a new mechanical planter, the use of rooted cuttings, and changes in irrigation have all made our bog renovation program boost our targets to new levels, and Kylie has risen to the challenge admirably.

Our target for planting is 2.5 acres per day. So far, our daily average is 2.25 acres per day, but that includes stopping for a really heavy rain (it can be a problem running the machines on very wet soil) and the first day, where we started with only one machine and moved to two after lunch. Without these factors, we are averaging 3 acres per day. Kylie credits this to a very hard working crew, led by foreman Kelvin Colon.

Another priority is taking the water off and installing the remaining sprinklers. Our daily target is to dump the water from five systems and get the sprinklers in, if they were not installed earlier. As the weather warms up and the plants come out of dormancy, we have to worry about frost protection as well, especially for bogs where we took the water off early. The goal is to be finished by April 27th; we are 50% complete as of today.

It’s easy to set targets, but you need to revisit and check outside influences. “You still have to plan for it,” Fred says. “Something always comes up. You don’t just say ‘oh well, we didn’t make it.’ You have to adapt.” Weather is always our biggest influence, but “mostly it works out,” he says. “The work doesn’t stop. You take advantage of the good days, and set targets knowing you’re going to need extra help sometimes.” Today, it was raining too hard to make planting possible, so some of the planting team is hard at work on sprinklers.

A 20-mile March is defined by several characteristics, among them clear performance markers, appropriateness to the enterprise, set within a proper timeframe, and achieved with high consistency. Our team, as always, is willing to do whatever it takes to achieve and improve upon our goals.

A year ago this week, Pine Island Cranberry launched picranberry.com in an effort to show people who we are and what we do, and our tradition of excellence continues today. It continues because for over 120 years we have stayed focused on doing our best, never quitting, and loving what we do. From fifty acres of wild bog to over 1400 acres of carefully cultivated cranberries, our success results from a drive to innovate as well as to continuously improve and grow.

This summer, we had the grand opening of our new shop, which has vastly improved our team’s efficiency.

We’ve talked about planting, both in the spring and in the fall.

We’ve introduced you to several of our team members.

We’ve taken you through every step of the harvest.

We have shown you every aspect of water management that is so crucial to everything we do.

We’ve sat up all night with members of our frost team.

And we have shown you what our team can do when they have to handle the unexpected.

But mostly, we hope that so far, we’ve shown you how much this place means to everyone on our team, who are always doing whatever it takes to make everything Pine Island Cranberry does better every day. As Bill says: “Our pride in growing high quality cranberries is matched by our love and respect for the land and our people.”

Pine Island GM Fred Torres likes to tell an old story about Bill Sr and a team member during planting. Bill asked the team member how much work he had left to do, and the man said, “I don’t know.” Bill then asked him how much he’d done so far. The man’s response was the same. Bill patiently asked him what he was planning on getting done tomorrow. The man again said, “I don’t know.” Fred says Bill then asked the guy: “You don’t know much, do you?”

He was laughing when he said it, Fred said, but his point remained: while the methods and goals have changed, setting targets is as important today as it was when Bill Sr was still around. “You have to have deadlines,” Fred says. “If you set targets, and you stick to them, it makes people more organized and focused. If you don’t set targets, you don’t get stuff done.”

In agriculture, just like any other business, setting targets is necessary. On the farm, things have to get done when it’s time to do them, and that’s all there is to it. Alternatives must also be built in, because weather is always a game-changer, especially this time of year, so set targets and keep flexibility in mind. Meeting the targets can be challenging; however, it keeps the team moving forward and achieving their goals.

When asked how things have changed, Fred says, “Today, we’re doing a lot more. Years ago, we got done harvesting, then we went to raking. We finished raking, began pruning blueberries, and started sanding along the way. When the raking was finished, we went to the spring jobs. We had your basic tasks for every season. There wasn’t bog renovation on the scale that we have now.”

“With technology advances, we have fewer people doing more work in the same amount of time,” he says. “Back in the day we’d do one gate a day. Today we can put two gates in one day like its nothing. Building them is easier; we only need two guys instead of six.” Setting targets for these jobs can assist in measuring how much will be accomplished in a certain amount of time. Advances in technology have also changed our planting goals: a new mechanical planter, the use of rooted cuttings, and changes in irrigation have all made our bog renovation program boost our targets to new levels.

The ultimate goal, as always, is bringing in more berries per acre. “But you can’t use a big crop as an excuse,” Fred says. “You still need a timeline.” Our team will often put in extra hours during the day, rather than taking extra days, especially on things that may not be affected too badly by the weather. “You don’t just make a plan; you also make contingencies. If you hear you’re going to get rain overnight, then you stay later to get something done, rather than wait two or three days for everything to dry out. The little things add up.” Very little affects the harvest, of course; the team works rain or shine, with the lone exception of lightning.

Pine Island CEO Bill Haines, Jr is a fan of author Jim Collins’ “Twenty-Mile March” concept, a term used in his book Great by Choice to define the concept for companies to keep a steady pace no matter the environmental factors. (The analogy Collins used was about the results of two teams led by Roald Amundsen and Robert Scott in 1911, who both wanted to be the first ones in modern history to reach the South Pole. Amundsen and his team survived, while Scott and his did not.) (Source.) This concept intrigued Bill primarily because it deals with two distinct types of issues that arise when running an ag business: delivering high performance in difficult times and holding back to avoid over-extension in good times.

One of the things CEO Bill Haines has always liked about farming is that when it’s time to do something, you do it. Unfortunately, as we have seen over the past six months or so, the weather does not always cooperate. That’s when Pine Island has to adapt plans in order to make the best decisions. At this time, our priorities are finishing up sanding, starting sprinkler installation, completing the Oswego renovation, and finishing prepping the ground for new buildings at the shop.

“We made an ambitious plan for sanding this year,” Bill says. “We usually start in January, and by the middle of February, we’re going steady. This year because of all the rain and slushy snow, the dams were so wet and sloppy that it made sanding impossible. Hauling will wreck dams, and since this has continued into March, we’re not as far along as we want to be. When we stopped to analyze, it was clear that if everything went perfectly we weren’t going to finish until March 26th…which is when we expected to start planting.” Well, that wasn’t acceptable to Bill or to our GM, Fred Torres. “You could make the case that it won’t kill us not to get it all done,” Bill says, “but the thing is, if you just add what’s left to next year’s to-do list, pretty soon it’s out of control, and you’ll never catch up.”

Bill and Fred sat down and went over some options. “You always have to have at least two plans,” Fred says. “We have a lot on our plate this month. But we do have a little bit of time to play with. We just need to look at what jobs have to get done, and then do them.”

As far as the sanding is concerned, Bill and Fred ran some numbers and decided to change things up a little. “There hasn’t been a lot of rigorous experimentation done with it; growers have just done it on the job,” Bill says. “Is an inch better than a half inch? Does it vary by variety? What’s the rotation: four years? Five? Six?” Sanding is expensive in terms of both labor and fuel. Eventually, he decided on a five year schedule. There have been ongoing experiments: “There are some Stevens bogs that haven’t been sanded in eight years that have been very productive,” Bill says. “On Ben Lears, a half-inch doesn’t seem to work very well, and we need to up it to an inch. But Early Blacks seem to thrive with half an inch.” So the new plan is to drop to a half inch of sand on the Early Blacks from this week on. It will save time, and then we can also compare results. “That’ll put us on target to finish by the 18th, weather permitting,” Bill says. “Which is much better than the 26th.”

Once this decision was made, PIICM Manager Cristina Tassone updated the paperwork, Bill communicated the changes the following morning to the entire Pine Island team, and Fred made a new plan. Equipment Supervisor Carlos Baez is taking advantage of the bad weather to service the excavator and the sander. (“If I did it at lunch time on a sanding day, it would take longer than half an hour and would hold the team up,” Carlos says.) The team is also patching the dams where necessary on the current sanding route. “You have to stay ahead,” Fred says. “Currently the weather is supposed to clear up, but if not, we’ll adapt. The patches are done, the sprinklers are done, the main line is on track…so the back up plan is to go back to cutting survey lines.”

By April 1st, the building project has to start. “As of today, the gravel is done,” Fred says. “Once it dries, we can level it and be ready to start. So ground prep is about finished.”

Other projects we’re working on during the weather-enforced delay are sprinkler installation and the new main irrigation line at the Oswego renovation. “[Bog Renovations manager] Joe Colon is working on the main line,” Fred says. “That should be done by the end of next week.”

While all of this is going on, we also have a team installing sprinklers. We remove the sprinklers before winter flood and reinstall them in the spring. The team will take the water off just long enough to put sprinklers back in and then re-flood before water comes off for good in April; this way we’ll have at least one-third to forty percent of it done before all of the water is off. “When the water comes off, they have to be ready for frost,” Bill says. “Protecting the vines from frost is our most important task in April and May.”

“We know what we have to get done, and we’re going to do whatever it takes to get that done,” Bill says. “And if that means changing gears from day to day, that’s what we’re going to do. This is why we need employees willing to be flexible and think out of the box.”

One of Pine Island’s core values is continuous improvement: doing everything we do better every day. We recently spoke about how well-maintained, consistently available equipment and facilities that are fully operational are instrumental to Pine Island’s daily efficiency and the success of our operation.

One of our recent facilities projects is replacing Pump House #52 at Ben Haines. While pump houses are routinely upgraded on a rotating basis, the engine in #52 needed to be replaced during the harvest. While inspecting it, our team discovered some other issues, so it was decided that we would raze the original altogether and rebuild.

Local resident Pat Tierney, Pine Island’s newest team member (he started shortly after Christmas), is currently working with facilities supervisor Mike Guest on this project. They started out by breaking up the concrete foundation and hauling it away. The next step was to be hauling in dirt to level the ground and pour the new foundation. “It didn’t quite work out that way,” Pat says. “Turns out so much water had gotten underneath the pump house that it’s pretty much quicksand. Now we’re moving sand to prep for when the water comes off the surrounding bogs; once that happens we can fix the ground and put the new pump house in place. Right now we’re keeping things stable.”

While Pat’s extensive and diverse experience includes driving heavy trucks, he says he still gets nervous backing down the dams. “I’ve never had to do it with water on both sides!” he says. “And it’s tough to get the truck straight so I can get in where I need to go. But as long as I don’t go swimming, I figure I’m ahead.”

His versatility has been a great addition to our team. Since he’s started, he has worked on the pump house project, sanding, building gates, and stringing swan line, among other things. “I actually really, really like the variety,” Pat says. “It’s cool to come in every morning and have something different to do.” And he enjoys working with Mike; the two of them finished their afternoon by efficiently constructing the frames for new pipe gates.

Pat also has a great appreciation for the land itself. “It’s pretty out here,” he says. “Just today, driving out here, I saw a big old hawk land this close to me. That’s something you don’t see all the time. At least, not that closely.” His drive to learn and develop new skills, as well as his willingness to do whatever it takes, makes him a great addition to the Pine Island team, and we look forward to seeing him flourish.

Our Pine Island team is currently sanding, cutting survey lines, and working on various facilities projects. In about a month, we’ll begin planting.

Last week, we talked about the first cranberry seminar held at Pine Island Cranberry for people new to the industry. A couple of weeks ago, PIICM manager Cristina Tassone and Integrity Propagation owner Abbott Lee held the second of three cranberry seminars at the Pine Island Cranberry office. The first topic of discussion was planting of new or renovated bogs. Abbott explains: “The main goal is to promptly establish a canopy for whichever variety you’re choosing to plant. And you need to have an adequately developed root system to assure that the variety becomes and remains dominant, ultimately leading to a highly productive bed.”

There are two methods of planting: conventional propagation, which means pressing mowed vines or prunings directly into the bogs to be established; and rooted cuttings, which means planting plants with roots already established. Pine Island has used both methods in the fall to replant damaged bogs; however, this spring we will be using rooted cuttings. Another concern with planting is implementing an irrigation program, both with ground water and sprinklers, that provides moisture for vine growth without causing excessive soil saturation, which can lead to favorable conditions for phytopthora, which in turn can lead to fruit or root rot.

Pine Island uses both ditches and sprinklers for irrigation. During the early spring, after the winter flood is removed, irrigation is usually covered by our frost protection program. However, concerns for adequate soil moisture should not be forgotten during frost season. Several warm, sunny days without rain or frost irrigation can result in the need for irrigation. Cranberries have, evolutionarily, very underdeveloped root systems. According to Abbott, once they start to wilt, you only have one to two hours before significant damage occurs. Checking the soil yourself is extremely important; tensiometers are good, but it’s important to learn the hands-on method, as well.

It is also important to implement a plant nutrition program to help assure maximum vine growth and root development. Pine Island works with Dr. Joan Davenport of Washington State University in order to best determine the nutrition needed for optimum crop yields and quantity. You want roots to match growth; it’s important to establish the root system before the runners begin to develop. Or, as Joan likes to say: “First year roots, second year shoots, third year fruits.”

Bill and Abbott both stressed the need to stay hands-on. “You need to be in your bogs in order to know your bogs,” Bill says. “In farming, you do what needs to be done when it’s time to do it. It works the same way for young bogs; they get what they need when they need it, and you have to know exactly what they need.”