In California’s San Joaquin Valley, nighttime temperatures have dipped below freezing since Christmas, but they haven’t dipped low enough to impact supplies. The same can’t be said with regard to how the cold front has impacted the western vegetable growing areas a bit further to the south.

For the last few nights, the temperatures in the citrus belt, mostly south of Fresno, have fallen to as low as 27 degrees. But the temperatures haven’t stayed at that level for very long and in most instances, the low has been a few degrees higher than that. “We have had no damage,” said Joel Nelsen, president of California Citrus Mutual.

Lettuce with frost in Holtville, CA, the week of Dec. 28.He said growers have been using wind machines and irrigation to warm their groves up a few degrees above the danger level. And he noted that earlier December rains put a lot of moisture in the ground which has led to a natural warming of the groves. Nelsen said thin-skinned mandarins are more at risk than the thicker-skinned navel crop but growers have not reported any damage of either so far. However, the CCM executive said the rest of this week still has some cold weather in the forecast so there are still bullets to be dodged. “But starting next week and throughout January the weather people are telling us that we are going to have a series of storms,” he said, noting that rainy weather in the valley typically means grove temperatures do not dip below freezing.

The California mandarin crop has been estimated at about 50 million cartons while navel orange growers are expected to harvest about 86 million cartons this year. Nelsen said harvest of both varieties are on track with fairly strong markets and very good demand.

The cold weather, however, continues to impact vegetable production in the southern desert areas of California and Arizona. Both the Brawley district in California and the Yuma area in Arizona are reporting temperatures far below normal, with the thermometer dropping below freezing at night and only rising to the low to mid-60s during the day.

Jason Lathos, manager of commodities for Church Bros. LLC, based in Salinas, CA, which has fields in both areas, said the frost has kept the harvesters out of the fields until close to noon every day. With quitting coming when the sun sets in late afternoon, there just isn’t enough time to fill the orders. In addition, he said the holiday season creates fewer picking days, and the cold weather has produced lighter yields.

Lathos expected the normal dip in demand during the weeks before and after Christmas to be accompanied by a dip in the f.o.b. price for most commodities. “That hasn’t happened. If anything we have seen a strengthening of the market the last couple of days,” he said on Dec. 29.

While traditionally, he would expect the market to loosen up over the next few weeks, Lathos said he cannot predict that will happen at this time. He noted that it is warmer in New York and Boston than it is in the California desert this winter. He said that unique situation has led to a supply and demand curve that is also out of whack.

Speaking during the week before Christmas, Mike Antle of Tanimura & Antle, based in Salinas, CA, said his firm was well behind in their fields and he reasoned that at some point the fields will catch up and there should be ample supplies to fill orders. He guessed that there would be promotable supplies by mid-January in most of the major crop — the big five as they are referred to: iceberg lettuce, romaine, celery, cauliflower and broccoli. However, he predicated his remarks on a return to normal temperatures, which has yet to occur. And Lathos said the forecast is for rain during next week (Jan. 4-10), which should also curtail harvesting. The Church Bros. executive said that until the weather warms up, he can’t promise any buyers promotable supplies.

The five key items were all experiencing very strong markets with each of them at least in the $20s and cauliflower still north of $40 per carton f.o.b.