Heartening start to season for growers

There has been some further vine loss over winter across the district among kiwifruit orchards hard hit by Cyclone Gabrielle, but early indications are that crop volumes this season look better than last year. This photograph was taken soon after the cyclone hit in February. File picture

The district’s croppers have been hard at work with their summer planting programmes and encouraged by the results so far, while grape and kiwifruit growers have also taken heart from the way their crops are shaping up.

The recent rain slowed up crop planting for a few days.

Corson Grain procurement manager Richard Hyland said they were about 75 percent of the way through their grain maize planting programme, which they started in early October.

“We feel that’s pretty good considering how up and down the weather has been, and we’re pretty happy with progress.”

The company aims to plant around 1600 hectares this season, similar to last year.

“The plants in the ground so far are going well,” Mr Hyland said.

“We hope to finish the programme within the next couple of weeks around Wairoa, Gisborne and Tolaga Bay.”

Coxco general manager Omi Badsar said they have made good progress with their squash planting.

“We’re well under way with it.

“We got held up a bit by the recent rain, but hopefully we will get going again in the next few days.”

The company would be about 30 percent of the way through at this stage.

“We hope to have it all done by early December,” Mr Badsar said.

“The early crops planted are looking good, really healthy, and we’re encouraged by that.”

Cedenco’s sweet corn planting programme is on track, according to operations general manager Mark Springer.

“We started in September and would be just under halfway through.

“It will be comparable to last year in terms of hectares planted.”

Mr Springer said the company would not be planting a tomato crop this season.

“We will be taking in squash from contract growers for production.”

This is an important time of year for the district’s grape growers too.

'Hoping for a decent season'

Gisborne Winegrowers chairman Mark Thompson said they were well into bud burst.

“It’s showing good signs, with a lot of grape bunches per shoot, and bud burst has been reasonably uniform throughout the district, which is good to see.

“So far we have been not been severely impacted by frost,” he said.

“We are cautiously optimistic at this stage about how the vintage will go.”

It’s a key time for kiwifruit growers too.

“We are right in the middle of flowering,” said NZKGI Gisborne representative Tim Tietjen.

“We’ve had pretty decent weather up to the wet weather earlier this week, so most growers will have enjoyed a good pollination.

“The prospects for fruit set in the next week or so look good.”

Mr Tietjen said as expected, kiwifruit vines that were under water for a long time due to Cyclone Gabrielle had not fared well coming out of winter.

“We have seen a degree of plant collapse and death, with perhaps 5-10 percent of vines lost across the district, and that’s on top of the vines that had already keeled over in the immediate aftermath of the cyclone.

“But on a positive note, the crop volumes that we do have look much better than last year.

“We’re hoping for a decent season.”