Ryan’s Corner November 2019

Here it is, November and we’re soon to welcome a new decade!

On Sept. 20th we received our first load of hazelnuts at the HGO plant in Donald. Being new to HGO and the Hazelnut industry, I heard the stories of the 2018 harvest being fast and furious by industry standards. The 2019 harvest has proved to be closer to what a normal year would look like for the industry. Loads of hazelnuts have been steadily arriving at the plant and off-loaded; waiting to be processed for our kernel customers or prepared for our in-shell sales. In my daily communications with growers and wash plants, the “guesstimate” is the crop is down about 10% from last year. The Jefferson variety will be up for some growers and the same as last year for most growers. We have seen large and jumbo Barcelona this year with excellent kernel fill. The Ennis variety looks like golf balls on the orchard floor, with outstanding large and jumbo counts.

I am quickly acclimating to the Oregon weather and enjoying the scenery of the Willamette Valley. Discussions with growers have kept me in direct contact with what is happening out in the orchards and wash plants. Harvest highlights have been the distribution of totes, picking up full totes, and supplying some of our larger farms with bulk trucking. Trucking can be difficult during harvest. I would like to thank Wilco
trucking for their help!

Lastly, we have new totes for the 2019 harvest. In order to keep our totes holding your precious cargo, I would like to ask your help in notifying me at (503) 278-2622 if you have extra totes (damaged or broken also accepted), so we can collect them for future needs.

Cheers,
Ryan Flaherty, HGO Grower Relations Manager