The founder and technical director of Avium, and co-founder of Smartcherry gave us his impressions on this technical event on cherries, held at the Monticello Casino.
What is the assessment you can make of this event?
The bottom line is that we met all our expectations. Since we launched Smartcherry in 2018, we always wanted to do a different kind of event and we were in debt with a welcome event, due to the social outbreak and the pandemic. In addition, as we grew, we believed that the event we had to do had to have an upgrade.
So we believe that it was a good joint venture with Yentzen Group, who have a lot of experience in this and we managed to do this nice event that we call Cherry Tech, which we thought of like that and we are achieving it.
We are fully booked and have heard excellent feedback. What do you think about the attendees?
One of the characteristics that we at Avium wanted to give to this event was that it would be a completely different format from the technical and extension point of view. I think that in events with a series of talks, the attendees do not have the capacity to absorb all the information and they do not give you the opportunity to socialize, which is also an important part of the event, since it allows you to meet with people you see a couple of times a year, share experiences and share with the sponsors.
So when we put together the format of a keynote, a forum and a break, and divide that by three, I think that makes it more attractive. A masterclass allows you to develop one or more objectives in a very extensive and clear way, it doesn't limit us in time to be able to develop the subject well, therefore, it is something that I personally appreciate very much as a speaker at many events.
So, I think that doing a master class or a longer talk allows you to develop the topics, the attendees who come need to consume that talk and take away their data, and complement it with a more relaxed forum for discussion and opinions. We may or may not agree among the participants, among the specialists, and I think that this is extremely valuable for the industry.
Everyone was very grateful for this first keynote speech in which you gave a complete overview of cherry production, with updated data and a lot of research by the Avium team. What were the fundamental pillars of this talk?
Look, one of the characteristics of this industry and of this species is that we are constantly searching for the perfect balance in terms of productive potential. This is a very challenging species in terms of finding that number and the number of productive potential, which is the perfect mix between the greatest amount of kilos possible and the best quality of condition. Many factors interact that we often don't even manage to reach that number. So I wanted to interpret this. We are constantly searching for the productive potential of cherries and the indicators that I personally see through Avium, I think are the ones that are influencing today and were the ones I showed in my presentation: bud fertility, abiotic stress, fruit growth curve and that complemented with how we can add technology to all these indicators, so that they are a little more accurate.
I am lucky in my professional life to be present at many presentations and events, but I think that for this particular event and because of its magnitude, it was also worth it that we had to arrive with the most up-to-date data possible, and that is what we achieved. This was thanks to the team that provides us with all the data analysis and the staging of that data so that we could reveal it to the public.
You always point out that each cherry season is different and in that respect, how important is the analysis of bud fertility, the soil analysis at the right time to be able to make applications and not repeat a recipe as if it were a cooking recipe.
Exactly, we often talk about recipes and, in my opinion, they are recommendations, not recipes. As you say, the analysis in different areas helps you to make the best decisions and try to make as few mistakes as possible. The analysis of bud fertility reveals the flowering potential that plants can have today and that flowering potential compared to their history, and that gives us tools to make decisions regarding load regulation, pruning, nutrition, etc., and complementing it with other types of analysis: nutritional analysis of foliar soil and nutritional analysis of fruit. Then all of that is put into a blender and gives us a recommendation that we, from an agronomic point of view, also have to interpret and carry out in the field in the simplest way possible.
We are in the season of full dormancy. What are the main concerns facing the industry at the moment? With a storm that has just left several cherry orchards flooded. First, let's start with the issue of recommendations for dealing with this type of episode and also the concern that exists about compliance with the hours of cold, which are essential for the next season.
I'll start with the last point: our main concern during the dormant season, which runs from May 1 to July 31, is the accumulation of cold. The plant accumulates cold in order to better express the reserves it kept the previous season for the new cycle. The colder we have, the better the plant expresses its reserves. To date, cold is scarce; probably in the last eight or ten years we have had the lowest accumulation of cold so far.
It can change absolutely, it is a daily photo, it is a weekly photo and the final sample of accumulation will be known on July 31. Although history says that the best years of cold accumulation, a large part accumulates during June, we have already shared with some specialists that it could be the last week of May to the third week of June and in those four weeks ideally accumulate more than 200 hours of cold, which has not been achieved.
But there are two things that are also super relevant and I have discussed them with some colleagues in recent weeks. Although we have less cold, which is a model for measuring ambient temperature, we also understand that the body that needs to accumulate cold is the plant.
A season that is less cold and rainy at the same time for my taste and for the taste of several colleagues, the rain is bringing more cold that is not reflected in the temperature or in the ambient temperature ranges according to the models we measure. Rainy years are certainly seasons of shorter photoperiod, which contributes to a better quality of dormancy.
We have to be prepared for the different strategies to get out of dormancy. We definitely recognize that this is a year of less cold accumulation, so we have to be prepared. However, it is not over yet. The season that just ended in Europe, mainly in Spain during November and December, which corresponds to our May and June, had very little or practically no cold accumulation. During January, a little more was accumulated and all the cold has been accumulating in February, which would be our August, and the season in Spain was in a very important setting condition.
Therefore, we have to see what tools we have to compensate for this lack of cold and help the plants, but let us not forget that the other complement to productivity, to fruit setting, is also given by spring temperatures. So, it could be that a lack of cold coincidentally in spring, with good temperatures, during the flowering period, may be enough to have good production.
That would be the opposite scenario to what happened last season, when we had a good accumulation of cold and good conditions in spring.
Absolutely, and that had an impact in Las Palmas in the fall of fruit. But that is what has just happened in Spain, where they had very poor cold accumulation, very good temperatures in spring and even a little more fruit set, and the opposite can also happen, where we can have a very good cold accumulation season and we have a bad spring. So I show my concern, I do my analysis, we have to be prepared, but this is not over.
Let us not forget the issue of flooding either.
First of all, I would like to give my support to the producers who are in this extremely complicated situation and the record that we have in some cases is quite gruesome, quite lamentable. We as a team have drafted a very simple document of five or six points and these are perhaps the bases for facing this situation.
The first point states that the garden needs to be cleaned up. There is rubbish, plant waste, and river waste. There are irrigation lines everywhere, and probably many irrigation systems that will have to be redone or undergo major maintenance.
The second thing is that there are two situations in terms of plants. A plant that was uprooted by dragging and that exposed its roots and the soil is eroded, so those roots have to be covered again or the soil has to be re-hilled so that those roots do not dehydrate, do not become exposed and the plant remains alive, and there is another situation in which this soil was silted up and new soil was left on top of the old soil, a little silted up and probably quite a bit higher than the original level. My recommendation for that is to oxygenate the necks, open an ornamental cup to oxygenate the neck, but it does not make much sense to remove all that soil that was dragged there, since it is practically impossible.
We have to take into account some phytosanitary management. We believe that microbial complexes via soil could be an important part of this strategy. I am not so much in agreement with creating programs for specific diseases, I think that this has to be broad spectrum and today we have a range of super interesting microbial complexes that colonize soil in our favor, beneficial fungi and bacteria.
Regarding the phytosanitary program, in special situations of complexity we should perhaps incorporate some biological fungicide into the winter applications, apart from the copper applications or other types that are usually carried out.
The last thing is that we have to do a new soil analysis in that type of garden, since it has completely changed. So we have to see what our soil is like, what we are going to participate in and how we are going to rearrange the nutritional programs that we had pre-established.
Deadline for that soil analysis?
There is no rush, from now until August. The soil programs in general will not start before the first week of October, therefore, I would focus on what is most urgent. I would focus on cleaning the irrigation line, removing the roots or loosening them. I think that a checklist of priorities should be made.
In conclusion, this is a very different season from last season. We have a late New Year that we know marks a before and after in cherry prices, which is on February 10, 18 days later than in 2023. How do we face this production season from the orchard? Because we are going to have to sustain many more weeks of a commercial window. Are there any recommendations from production for that? Strategies are being considered, for example, to break dormancy, when in reality today it is not so interesting to advance.
From a commercial point of view, I may not be the most suitable person to answer, but what I can technically tell you is that we will achieve the maximum commercial potential with the best cherry at the time. Today our vision is to achieve the best size we can make, with the best quality and condition and to harvest the cherry at its best moment.
Early areas will always be ahead, late areas may not make sense to be ahead, mid-range areas will have to distance themselves, but regardless of the area, the best commercial result will be obtained with cherries harvested at their best moment, with all their quality and condition characteristics perfectly expressed.
And this season, which gives us almost three weeks of time, is a good setting to do that.
Absolutely, especially for the later cherry in the last third of the season, which, due to the effects of previous years, Covid, post-pandemic, and logistical problems, have not had such a good time. Last season they had a good break in some cases, but I think they need a slightly longer season for the production of the last quarter or the last third of the season.
