High yielding citrus harvest underway in South Australia

Citrus SA chair Mark Doecke said harvest of some early mandarin varieties kicked off in April, before early navel oranges were picked from late April, with Washington navels picking up about a fortnight ago.

"We're seeing good yields so far, all varieties seem to have a heavy crop," he said.

"With the mild summer, the trees held onto a lot of flowers.

"Normally, if you have a hot spell in spring, the trees will drop a heap of flowers, and you go back to a more normal or average crop.

"But this year the trees have held onto a lot of fruit.

"The only disadvantage, is the fruit is a bit smaller - quality is still excellent though."

With last year's crop also being heavy, Mr Doecke said some growers were experiencing a breakdown of the albedo - the white spongy material between the fruit and the skin, likely caused by nutrient stress.

"We had a heavy crop last year, that would have sucked a bit out of the tree," he said.

"If you weren't on your game and didn't realise that, you could be caught."

Labour-wise, Mr Doecke said getting enough workers would be "tight", but he was confident most growers would be able to fill picker positions.

"Between 800-900 Pacific Islander workers have turned up in Australia," he said.

"Last year we didn't have them, but we did have some backpackers who were forced to stay here, so both seasons we got by, even if the workforce is different.

"Over summer, there was less availability, but there are fewer citrus summer fruit verities grown these days.

"Valencias are a summer fruit, but that acreage is still shrinking, so there were sufficient pickers for that."

Waikerie grower David Arnold, GM Arnold & Son, said he had been "flat out" with harvest since the last week of May, mostly picking Washington navels, and starting with Imperial mandarins.

"Yield for us is about on par with last year," he said.

"We're fairly consistent, but the size of fruit is certainly variable for many growers across the Riverland."

Despite the good yields, Mr Arnold said drizzly weather had made harvest challenging.

"The rain has obviously been great for broadacre croppers, but it has been a nightmare for us," he said.

"We're having to pick a lot on the weekend, when the fine weather has been.

"Segregating fruit according to size is also taking longer than usual, and there are certain patches where the fruit is splitting on the side, which is a bit abnormal, so segregating those out adds time too."

But Mr Arnold was thankfully not short on labour.

"We aren't getting as many bins filled as we'd like to each day, but that's not because of pickers, but because of the weather," he said.

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Mr Arnold said an additional challenge this year had been "flatter" local markets, compared to last year.

"Last year, with the pandemic, we were worried that demand wouldn't be there, but people were obviously buying everything they could get their hands on," he said.

"This year, things are back a bit. It's a bit fickle.

"We need local people buying citrus to keep that local market strong."

Loxton North mandarin and orange grower Peter Hill, Ridgehill Properties, said some of his orchards were up 15 per cent to 20pc on yield, compared to last year.

Mr Hill, who runs the orchards along with wife Michelle, said he had prepared for good yields this year, and had upscaled his thinning program as a result.

"Because the trees were laden with fruit last year, we did anticipate that we'd have to increase our thinning program this year," he said.

"Yes that came at a cost, but hopefully that will pay off, because to-date the size of our fruit is good."

LOXTON North citrus grower Peter Hill is one of many Riverland growers who was relying on pre-harvest baiting, as outlined in Interstate Certification Assurance 28, to be accepted as an adequate control method for fruit coming from fruit fly suspension or outbreak zones.

He has been left in a lurch after federal government approval of ICA28 as a sufficient treatment method, was not approved.

Mr Hill has 80 hectares of orchards, of which about 40ha lie within the fruit fly suspension zone. While there has been no evidence of fruit fly in his orchards, precautions are taken when fruit is travelling to their packing shed Venus Citrus in Loxton.

"We were hopeful that (pre-harvest baiting) was going to be sufficient, but it apparently isn't," he said.

"Other options like fumigation or dipping reduce shelf-life definitely aren't our preference."

'Dirty' fruit from Mr Hill's orchards within the suspension zone is segregated from the 'clean' fruit outside the zone, and is treated at the packing shed to meet domestic and export market requirements.

Citrus SA chair Mark Doecke said they were working with the state government to "look outside the box" for solutions.

"As an industry, we worked with the state government to negotiate with the federal government to let ICA28 continue to be accepted, but it hasn't been. It's really disappointing," he said.

"I think more industry consultation is needed before these decisions are made. We need people doing the research before these things are declared not allowed."

The state government was contacted for comment.

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