Comment by nradov
17 hours ago
It's so weird for you to be fearful of something when you don't know how farming works. Every year farmers cut down a bunch of trees and plant new ones in response to costs and market demand. So what. This is routine and seldom makes the news.
Canned fruit, like what these farmers were producing, has been losing popularity for years. You can't force consumers to like it.
No, not typically. And I know this because I grew up around farmers and farmers that had orchards. Trees would be cut down and replaced, usually if the tree was sickly. But not because this year plums are doing better on the market.
As I said, trees take a long time to bear fruit. It's not typical that a farmer will cut down a tree in their orchard in response to market pressure as that tree represents a huge investment.
If that were the case, then why are there so many peach trees currently? Why hasn't the entire orchard been replaced with olive trees?
Do you actually have farming experience?
Yes, I actually have farming experience. Farmers aren't naive about this stuff. They forecast future trends as best they can and will replace trees (or other crops) when it seems profitable. Newly planted fruit trees will generally start producing within a few years and output increases as the trees grow, then eventually levels off and declines as they age. A tree is just another capital asset with a limited lifespan. Much ado about nothing.
People have this image of farmers as ignorant bumpkins, when owners of even small family farms are some of the most intelligent, objective, and economically-motivated businesspeople I've known.
The first IBM PC I ever used was in the home office of a farmer who was using it for economic forecasting. And I grew up in the middle of a large city (for reference, I had an Atari 800 at home, regularly used Apple ][s at school, my friends were raving about the newly-introduced Commodore 64, and the most impressive tech I had ever seen was a VAX 11/780).
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Ok, then I'll just reissue my 2 questions
> If that were the case, then why are there so many peach trees currently? Why hasn't the entire orchard been replaced with olive trees?
I agree, that farmers forecast and switch up crops. But I disagree with you that you have a bunch of farmers that have mixed orchards setup because of that forecasting. It's not like wheat or barely where you could switch between the two even mid year if you were crazy enough.
I'd also point out that the first fruiting isn't exactly a bumper crop. It takes several more years after that first fruiting before you get to the point where a tree is fully productive.
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There’s not a lot of overlap between prime citrus and prime olive farmland.
> Every year farmers cut down a bunch of trees and plant new ones in response to costs and market demand
I'll admit my experience is more with vineyard than orchards, but at least for grape, this isn't true. You only cut down old, unproductive vines, and market demand is not a factor. You never know how much you will produce YoY, so basically you try to only produce what your domain can handle. (The english translation for the following will be rough i realize).
On the "planting" side, you're wrong: a limited stock of "rootstock" (if this is the correct translation of "porte-greffe") is produced each year. As those are specific to a certain type of soil and take time to grow, you don't produce a ton each year. And vines "rootstock" are _a lot_ easier to grow than other trees (you have a mother-vine that you don't prune, you bury its branch in the soil, and over a year it will develop roots). My guess is that for orchards, your rootstock should take 3-4 years, so it isn't that easy.
Grape vines have a longer productive lifespan than most fruit trees so I don't know what point you're trying to make. Lots of wine grape vines are being torn out in California. Competition is intense, we're well past "peak wine" (consumers aren't drinking as much), and honestly a lot of it was kind of garbage anyway.
Ever wondered why there are few merlot vineyards in Napa these days? Dozens of vineyards are uprooted and replanted each year in that tiny valley alone in response to market demand.
> Canned fruit, like what these farmers were producing, has been losing popularity for years. You can't force consumers to like it.
Has canned fruit actually lost popularity? Or did the grocery stores decide that the shelf space had a higher profit margin pushing something else?
The last couple of times I tried to get canned fruit for a recipe I had to actively hunt for the particular cans of fruit I needed (I needed to hit 3 different grocery stores).
I haven't tracked peaches recently, but I can tell you that canned apricots have been a bit thin on the ground for at least a couple of years.
> Has canned fruit actually lost popularity? Or did the grocery stores decide that the shelf space had a higher profit margin pushing something else?
> The last couple of times I tried to get canned fruit for a recipe I had to actively hunt for the particular cans of fruit I needed (I needed to hit 3 different grocery stores).
> I haven't tracked peaches recently, but I can tell you that canned apricots have been a bit thin on the ground for at least a couple of years.
Groceries stores with canned fruit being harder to find is entirely consistent with it being less popular. Pushing you to go to another store for something is bad, if you're a grocery store. That's a great way to drive off customers. There's a lot of shelf space at my local grocery stores still dedicated to fairly-redundant products or high amounts of extra copies of items, so I don't think they're being pushed out because something else is way more profitable. (My local stores have much larger selections of canned beans than canned peaches, for instance.)
I think it's just generational trends. Generally health-conscious consumers these days are more skeptical of canned vs fresh, and non-health-conscious have more junk food options than ever. It's also gotten easier to source fresh fruit across seasons than thirty or forty years ago, further squeezing canned options.
> Has canned fruit actually lost popularity?
Compared to Del Monte's heyday in the previous century? Absolutely.
A remarkable amount of fruit is available all year, or most of the year now. I cant imagine eating canned fruit by choice.
Another thing in short supply these days is actually being able to buy an actually good Apple pie or Peach pie. Oh well…
I shall try and see if I can get a Peach or an Apple pie. This weekend you know the old-fashioned pie that actually tastes good and is well made.
That’s another thing that’s in short supply along with actually getting any good baked goods unless you can go to a small Bakery somewhere if you can find one they usually cost a more but not that much more than what you could find in the supermarket times have been changing for the worst when comes to baked goods.
Del Monte in recent times was passed between four equity companies. One of those equity companies actually bought them twice. Del Monte was on the pathway to hell.
Hopefully some of those trees can be transplanted within a 50 mile radius of where they are. If I lived up in that area. I would seriously try to see if I could transplant a few.
A well-made, old-fashioned peach pie. With good vanilla ice cream on top. McConnell’s, Häagen-Dazs or the best you can find locally or maybe homemade.
I forgot it was even a thing.
> Has canned fruit actually lost popularity?
Yes. Global supply chains have improved, so it's easier to get fresh fruit year round (or closer to it) than it used to be. If they can, people will choose fresh over canned, for obvious reasons.
> people will choose fresh over canned, for obvious reasons
Not at all obvious. A lot of "fresh" produce in the US was refrigerated for more than a week before it arrived in the supermarket, from varieties that were designed to hold up to transport rather than flavor. Fruit that was canned at the height of the season is often much more flavorful than "fresh" off-season fruit.
The US has a problem with packing fruit in added sugar, which is sad but not inherent to canned fruit.
Where I live peaches are rare. It's all pears, oranges, and fruit cocktail. Not joking, there's five different variants of pears on the shelf at the grocery store, from sugar free to light syrup, and from three different brands. Canned plums? Nope. Apples? Nope. Strawberries? Nope. Cherries? Only around Thanksgiving and Christmas.
At the very least I can get all of those fresh and not canned, but honestly I'd prefer having canned versions as well because of all of the import uncertainty that ended up affecting things this past winter.
> Has canned fruit actually lost popularity? Or did the grocery stores decide that the shelf space had a higher profit margin pushing something else?
Do grocery stores make their own decisions about what goes on their shelves? I thought they mostly rented the shelf space to food vendors who were responsible for that.
For example, a while ago I complained on HN that a particular flavor of Triscuits was reliably out of stock whenever Safeway discounted Triscuits, and I was told that the way to address that, were I so minded, is to reach out to Nabisco on Twitter, because they - and not Safeway - make the stocking decisions.