CBS Farms has new grower in Oxnard, adds organic line to Oxnard program
CBS Farms has new grower in Oxnard, adds organic line to Oxnard program
CBS Farms LLC in Watsonville, CA, which has strawberry production in both Oxnard, CA, and Watsonville, has a new grower in Oxnard this year and has added organic strawberries to its Oxnard program.
Previously, the company had organic strawberries from Watsonville but not from Oxnard. “Now we are going to have organics year-round,” said Charlie Staka, director of sales.
CBS handles strawberry sales for Watsonville-based Colleen Strawberries Inc. and Beach Street Farms LLC.
In Oxnard, the company’s conventional berries are packed in the “Beach Street” label. The organic berries are in the “Surfside Organic” label, Staka said.
The company’s total acreage for Oxnard this year is similar to last year, Staka said.
CBS Farms’ Southern California strawberry harvest started “earlier than normal and with good quality” this year. “We are looking forward to a good season down there,” he said Jan. 21
“We are growing San Andreas and some Ventana and some of the Radiance” in Oxnard in both the conventional and the organic programs, he said. “We’ve been picking there for over a month. It was about mid-December when we started.”
The company’s fields were not adversely affected by the cold weather California experienced the first week of December. “We are on the coast, so we really didn’t have a freeze that first week of December.” Some other growers who have fields further inland in the Oxnard area did experience a freeze, he said.
Although production in Oxnard is off to a strong start this year, it will still be around the first or second week of March before the fields there are up to full production, Staka said.
From Oxnard, CBS Farms’ strawberry production goes “right up to the Watsonville area,” he said. “We will probably start in the north the first week of April.”
Continuing on sales at CBS this season with Staka are Bob Rigor and Jerry Summers.
