Johnston Farms, a fourth-generation family farming operation in Edison, CA, near Bakersfield, started shipping citrus in 1982. So the wintry weather of early January that brought five consecutive nights of sub-freezing temperatures was nothing new, nor was it a drastic setback — but it was a pain in the neck.

Mandarins are an important part of Johnston Farms’ program. While sub-freezing weather took a bite out of the crop, there will still be marketable volume and good quality. (Photo courtesy of USDA/ARS)“We were on pins and needles for a week. There was a little damage on the Mandarin variety — what we’re seeing is damage at the top part of the trees, the lower part of the trees seem to be okay — but the Navels are fine. It just takes a little more time off your lifespan when you’ve got to worry about these things, that’s all,” the company’s Harley Phillips told The Produce News Jan. 15. “There’s going to be some loss, that’s unavoidable. You can’t take a chance on sending out fruit with any quality issues at all, and we won’t.”

The crop will be carefully culled to avoid shipping any product dinged by the cold, but there will still be ample volume and excellent quality, Mr. Phillips said.

“So far we’ve got a pretty good deal here,” he said. “We’ve had good movement, some extremely nice prices, some small sizes like everybody else and we’ve managed to work through them, but it’s been a pretty decent year this year. The quality this year has been outstanding for the industry as a whole — the sugar content has been high and the reception of the fruit has been good everyplace it’s gone.”

Said Mr. Phillips, “Our main deal right now is Navels through the end of March, some of the Mandarin varieties for another six to eight weeks and a few grapefruit for six to eight weeks. Then we’ll be done with citrus and go into potatoes and Bell peppers. But we’ll have fruit here sometime into March, maybe the middle of March.”

John C. Johnston, started farming potatoes in the Edison area of Kern County in 1947, and the family planted its first Navels in 1963, making 2013 the 50th anniversary of the company’s involvement in citrus. For 35 years, Johnston Farms has grown, packed and shipped potatoes and Bell peppers, and it also grows carrots for other marketers.

“We started packing our first fruit in 1982,” said third-generation partner Dennis Johnston. “We strive to have good flavor and high-quality fruit here. We try to do the best we can.”

While Navels are the company’s top-volume product, “Our Mandarin deal continues to grow slowly,” Mr. Johnston said. “The clementine guys will do in a day what we do all season. But we are real happy with the Satsuma. We think it is the best-eating fruit out there, so we have stuck with it rather than clementines, and demand has been good all these years. It has been good, consistent movement, and people like the flavor. They really like the Satsumas.”