Category Archives: General

Joan Davenport – Spring 2015 visit

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If it’s springtime, it must be time for a visit from Dr. Joan Davenport! Joan, a former researcher for Ocean Spray, works with Pine Island Cranberry to provide guidance on fertilizer, water, and nutrients, as well as general PIICM management. “At this point in the growing season, we are evaluating the plants for fruit potential and trying to develop recommendations for applications between bloom and fruit set. To do this, I look at hook, the length and color of the new upright growth, and the amount and color of old leaves, including looking for leaves from two growing seasons ago,” Joan says.

“This year Joan came a week later than usual because of the cool spring; the buds were still tight when they are usually beginning to break,” says PIICM Manager Cristina Tassone. “In order for Joan to make a good recommendation, we want to at least be a little past roughneck. The timing this year was perfect. We were able to complete our roughneck fertilizer plan before she came. The growth stage was between hook and scattered bloom. We were able to see the potential crop, and she was able to make some recommendations that she would not have seen if she came a week earlier. We were also able to walk the bogs comfortably with the mild weather; we are usually very hot and watching for wilt as we walk the bogs in May with Joan!”

New Production Manager Mike Haines was pleased to see Joan. “There aren’t really textbooks about cranberry cultivation,” he says. “So it’s great to get a chance to actually walk through with Joan and get a practical education. I can learn both what kind of nutrition the plants need and also why they need it. This is the first time I’m learning a lot of this stuff, so I’m glad to have her here to answer questions. It makes me confident that before too long I’ll be able to make these decisions on my own.”

In general, Cristina says, “This spring has been different for us. We’ve had quite a few frost nights and not so many sunny and hot days to move the plants. It seems like the plants grew over two weekends. Now we are back to cooler weather and the flowers are just waiting to pop. I estimate that all of our bogs are going to look different after this weekend where we are expecting sunny days and warmer weather.”

Gates Harrow project

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During the last harvest, Pine Island was very pleased with the performance of our new Gates Harrow, which picks cleanly, quickly, and efficiently. The learning curve was a little steep at first, as you would expect. Our team had to learn how to move the ramps (used for entering and exiting the bog) quickly as well as set them up for the machine; it had to be right so the tractor can easily turn around with as little overlap as possible. However, as the season progressed, we found we would need to make some adjustments for the next season.

“With the natural water flow going through all the time, our ditches are wider and our dams are higher to accommodate the water flow and its fluctuations,” explains COO Bryan vonHahmann. “We identified several areas where the ditches are too wide for the ramps that we use to bring the Gates Harrow out.”

So this week, our team began filling in those ditches on the bog side. It has evolved into a slightly larger project (“…as such things tend to do,” says Bryan pragmatically) as it means also moving some valves closer to the dam as well as thoroughly removing grass, turf, and debris before narrowing the ditches. Other adjustments we are making for the next harvest include widening gates that are too narrow for the machine to pass through, as well as pushing back trees that are too close to some bogs, making it difficult for the Gates Harrow to maneuver.

“That Gates Harrow is eighteen feet wide,” Bryan says. “And we’re running a second new machine for the 2015 harvest, so we need to make sure everything is just right!”

Renovation updates: pump houses

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Our team was ready this week for the next step in our Black Rock renovation: installing the new engines at the pump houses! This part of the reno is handled by our Facilities/Equipment team, and they certainly have a lot to do.

“Whenever we renovate a system, everything gets replaced new. All new irrigation, all new underdrain, all new water control structures,” explains Facilities/Equipment manager Louis Cantafio. “The old engines come out and get completely rebuilt; they were definitely old enough to replace. We’re also pre-gaming a little bit for the automation process. It’s a little more efficient for our team to work on this at the shop rather than going engine to engine out in the field. Because when the reno team is ready to set main line, the engines must be there already. We don’t ever want to hold up the reno team; the stuff they depend on has to be done ahead of time.” Then once the engines have been set up, Facilities Supervisor Mike Guest can put the buildings up.

Welder Fred Henschel has been working on the aluminum fixtures for the new pumps. “I started these a few months back,” he says. “When the old ones come out, I do try to recycle some parts in other projects, but with these we like to try to keep everything new. We don’t want to have to worry about a line going bad because it rotted away in only a couple of years.” Nonetheless, he likes to be prepared, and is also making a few spares, just to be on the safe side. It’s not much like work, according to him: “I just like to build stuff, really!”

With seven systems to take care of, that’s a lot of work, but the equipment team is up to the challenge. “It’s all about preventing downtime for other departments,” says Louis. “They shouldn’t be held up because of equipment.” And now that everything is installed, our reno team can move on to the next step: installing the main lines!

Fertilizer application

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It’s the growing season, and that means fertilizer application has begun!

The amount of fertilizer to be applied is determined by variety, soil conditions, and past practices, requiring constant evaluation of current conditions, history, and trends. Nutritional needs are also different for young vines as opposed to established plantings.

In addition to aerial methods (as always, expertly done by Downstown Aero Crop Service) our team is also trying “fertigation”: a uniform application via irrigation system.

Supervisor Jeremy Fenstermaker explains: “We inject it into the system via the dog leg coming out of the pump rather than pulling it through the pump itself and subjecting it to extra wear and tear. We’ve also put measures in place to keep it from pushing back into the water supply. After the application is done, we then continue to run the system to both flush it out with fresh water and make sure we get enough water into the soil itself.”

“As long as everything’s constant, you’re getting the same application,” says manager Mike Haines. “Which makes it even more important to have your sprinklers working properly; it helps uniform application for both water and fertilizer.” The team needs to do it early in the morning for the best coverage, testing it on the systems at Boricua. “We’re in the early stages of determining if it works for us or not. Ideally, if it works, we could automatically fit the pump houses with a tank as standard.”

The advantage, both Mike and Jeremy agree, is that you can really fine-tune what each particular bed will need. It’s also highly flexible; the team can work it in with the irrigation schedule and make sure to keep the balance just right. “We can refine the process, just like we did with irrigation,” Mike says. “That way everything gets what it needs when it needs it.”

Bog renovation – spring update

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Our team is still working hard on our 2015 bog renovation plan, hitting all their targets and moving as fast as they can! New Bog Renovation Manager Steve Manning definitely has his hands full: “We should be putting in the irrigation at Black Rock next week. Jorge [Morales] is screening sand for Warehouse, and Junior [Colon] is at Turf leveling the ground to get ready for the sand over there.”

Other major overhauls to Turf include removing a dam and getting ready to build a new pump house. “We’re shifting the pump location to the other end, though we haven’t built the pad yet. We’re also rearranging dams so that only one canal will be up at the top of the system, which should make it easier to control the water,” Steve says. This time of year, between frost and re-planting, has made things a little challenging for him, but hiring subcontractor Wayne Sweet has been a big help as far as supplementing labor and equipment. The team has even gotten a head start on the 2016 renovation, with old vines being hauled out already.

The beautiful weather has been a help, but also a hindrance, Steve says. “The weather’s been good and we’ve been moving fast, but we really could use a little more rain.” The dams, which can fall apart in too much rain, can also start to crumble if they get too dry. So our equipment team put together a “water truck” in order to keep the moisture level just right: whatever it takes to keep the Hydremas happy!

GM Fred Torres is pleased with the progress. “I think reno’s going well. A lot’s getting done now. Weather’s been good, equipment’s running. We’re working on pump houses, installing the main line, all that’s falling into place, and we should be done in time to plant in September,” he says. “This time of year there’s a lot to do for reno, and a lot going on at the farm…we have frost, and planting, and all the other jobs, and sometimes we have to add or take away people. But Steve understands that. It’s a bit of a challenge, yeah, and there’s a lot to do. But you can get it all done. If you work together, if you communicate, if you manage the people, you can get it done and hit the targets. Everything falls in place.”

Automation

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Not too long after the website launched, we talked about one of the toughest tasks on the place: monitoring frost conditions. As we explained back then, one of the toughest things cranberry growers do is managing springtime frost conditions. In the spring, there is a danger to the crop when the temperature drops. 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. It’s no exaggeration to say there would be no crop if we didn’t watch for frost on the bogs.

It’s demanding work that takes a lot out of our frost crew every year, so we’re always trying to find ways to improve the process. This year, we are launching phase one of an automation process that will hopefully increase efficiency and reduce strain on our team! COO Bryan vonHahmann explains: “We all sat down and looked at some of the things we’d done in the past with weather stations and the like. After discussing the successes and failures, we knew what we did and didn’t want. We spent time talking to producers and basically entertained two options: design and build a system ourselves, or go with an outside firm.” Eventually, the team settled on an outside firm and hired Joe Lord, from Wisconsin. Joe and his team built a lot of the equipment and staged it for us, then hauled it from Wisconsin and have been here deploying for the past week. “We’re going to have seven pumps automated, then based on the success of those, we’ll add another thirty every year for the next three years,” Bryan says. “We currently have forty probes scheduled for thermometers and tensiometers, and will be deploying all probes tomorrow. The pumps are online, we have permits for two 100-foot towers to boost communications, and the team will have the ability to check remotely via iPad.”

The rest of the team can’t wait to see the results. “Automated thermometers for frost is going to be exciting for us,” says PIICM Manager Cristina Tassone. “Each year we put out around seventy or more orchard thermometers around the farm for the guys to get out of their trucks and check while they are monitoring temperatures for frost. Having the automation will help us save them from always having to do that, and it will also cut down on actual time having to monitor the thermometers. A couple guys won’t need to come out early to check temperatures; Gerardo can watch the computer screen and when an area gets close to his ‘go’ temp, he can send his crew out.” Automated tensiometers are also going to save a lot of time for travel and labor. “We install about twenty-five tensiometers each year around the farm. It takes one person the whole morning to travel to each tensiometer and record the readings, then they report the readings to the managers who need to use the data to make water management decisions. Having the automated sensors will help enormously, and will allow us to make better decisions in a timely manner.” The team will still check the tensiometers physically every couple weeks for maintenance, however.

By all accounts, Joe Lord and his crew have been phenomenal to work with, highly attentive to our needs and working round the clock to help make this as efficient as possible for us. Facilities Supervisor Mike Guest is more than willing to meet them halfway: “Anything they need, I’m here to support them. If there are parts they need, it’s better for them if we run to get them, especially with them being so far from home. They’re great guys. I knew just from talking to them on the phone that they’d be great to work with.”

Rutgers Haines™ Variety

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Some exciting recent news from the research side of the cranberry industry: Rutgers has released their latest variety, named for the late Bill Haines, Sr.

From the release:

The Haines™ Cranberry Variety…resulted from a 1999 cross between the Crimson Queen® variety as the seed parent and #35 as the pollen parent. The #35 variety is an unpatented variety from a ‘Howes x Searles’ cross from the 1940s USDA/NJAES Cranberry Breeding Program. Haines variety was one of 138 progeny of this 1999 cross, made at the Philip E. Marucci Center for Cranberry Research in Chatsworth, NJ. Haines variety was initially selected for its very high yield potential, mid-season ripening, large round berry (averaging about two grams per berry) and uniform fruit color. In 2007, the Haines variety was selected for further testing in advanced replication selection trials in Oregon, Washington, and Wisconsin. The plots continued to exhibit the variety’s consistent high yields with mid-season ripening. Haines has also exhibited less fruit rot than Stevens in these plots.

Dr. Nick Vorsa of Rutgers explains: “Prior to Integrity Propagation and the diligence of Abbot Lee in DNA fingerprinting and virus indexing with Rutgers varieties, there was little or no effort for cranberry propagators to sell vines of 100% purity of a variety and there was little assurance that a grower purchasing prunings, mowings, or plants of a variety were ‘true-to-type’, nor the level of ‘off-type’ contamination.”

Part of the reason behind the decision to name the new variety for Bill Sr, Nick says, is that Bill generously offered beds for the early Rutgers cranberry breeding program: “He greatly enjoyed walking the Rutgers breeding plots on the bed and observing the performance of over 1,600 plots.” As the release says, “[e]mbracing new technology was a priority for Bill”; he never took anything for granted and was always looking for ways to improve the crop not just for his own farm, but for his fellow growers as well.

Integrity Propagation has been working with Rutgers for several years to develop Haines stock and is currently taking orders for 2016. We look forward to seeing the results!

Pine Island Team Profiles: Caesar Colon

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Long time team member Caesar Colon has been with us for over thirty years, has done just about everything there is to do, and has done it well!

Caesar is hearing impaired and can read lips in both in English and Spanish. Not too many people here have enough knowledge to speak with him in ASL, but he is always willing to meet people more than halfway when communicating. “He’ll write everything down if people can’t understand,” says GM Fred Torres. “He’ll draw diagrams, whatever he needs to do. He’s a really, really smart guy; way back when he asked me for a map with the names of all the bogs. I wrote them all down, he memorized the map, and now he knows his way around the place better than just about anybody.” This, plus his extensive knowledge of the equipment, makes Caesar one of our best truck drivers.

“Back when he first started, we were both working on the gathering crew during harvest,” Fred says. “We had to figure out a way to signal to him when to move the truck while it was being loaded, because the usual signals we use are calling to the driver or thumping the roof. What he did instead was watch the mirror, and when I was ready to move, I told him to watch my shovel. When I would put it in front of the mirror, Caesar’d pull forward. When I lifted it back up, that meant the truck had to stop.” He laughs. “None of the guys could figure out how we were doing it! But that’s Caesar. You work it out with him and he’ll get it done, whatever it takes.”

Caesar is a natural leader and is now the picking crew leader on the Orange harvest team under the supervision of his brother-in-law Gerardo Ortiz. “He’s a hard worker,” Gerardo says. “And I’m not just saying that because he’s family. He can work any job you tell him to and whatever it is, he gets it right away. Tractor, truck, machine…he’s flexible and really, really smart.”

“He’s a good operator and a good guy,” says Fred. “It’s always fun to work with Caesar.”

Chile – sand screener

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Back in February, our equipment team was working to prep our old sand screener to ship it to our affiliate farm, Cranberries Austral Chile (CAC).

Ernie, who was the lead on the project, put in a lot of time making the necessary repairs for easy maintenance when it gets down to Chile. “We want to make sure it’s in great shape for those guys,” he said at the time. “…Basically, we’re going over it and making sure everything is right and that it’s running well.” He also mentioned that actually getting it into the shipping container was going to be a project in itself, and he was absolutely right!

Coco Mercado says, “We did a lot of prep work. All the bigger stuff wouldn’t fit inside the container, so we had to disassemble all the big pieces and make absolutely sure all fluids were drained in order to pass through Customs.” Supervisor Carlos Baez says it took the entire day to disassemble everything, but it is about ready to go! “It’s going to be a tight fit, I can tell you right now,” he says. “But I took a lot of pictures as we were taking everything apart, so once it arrives they should be able to put it back together pretty easily.”

Facilities and Equipment Manager Louis Cantafio is pleased the project is just about wrapped up. “The biggest challenge was getting the conveyor off, but the worst is over,” he says. “Once it gets down there, CAC has the bigger challenge in putting it back together!” CAC, however, has been fantastically helpful about project details. “I thought I would need to research shipping companies, but they have people they deal with all the time and took care of all the transport logistics; it was great.” He’s pleased that this project is wrapping up so the team can turn their attention to some other big projects: in addition to sending some other equipment down to Chile with the screener, the team is working on several maintenance and building projects right here at home. “We’re doing a lot of work on the pump houses making sure they stay in compliance, we got the new Hydremas, we had some involvement in the camp reno, and then we’re pouring bases for new pump houses and rebuilding engines for the bog renovation project. We have a lot going on!”

“But ultimately, CAC is going to be able to increase their efficiency in processing sand, and that’s a job well done for us,” Louis says. “My team always does whatever it takes to hit our targets.”

Spring tasks: 2015

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Spring seems to finally be here for good, and our team is taking full advantage! Bog renovation is moving full speed ahead, the team is installing sprinklers, other team members are training on heavy equipment, and best of all, our forest stewardship program is starting to give us great results. Read more about it on our forestry blog here!