Like the rest of the world, Florida’s citrus growers are ready to turn the page on 2020. The past several months will obviously be remembered for world-shaking events like the pandemic. But for citrus producers, the impacts of coronavirus only exacerbated already challenging business conditions, including a season marked by low prices for processing fruit.

As the 2020-2021 season gets under­way, Florida citrus growers hope to see prices return to more normal, sus­tainable levels.

In 2018-2019, the crop bounced back after Irma — greater than anticipated — at nearly 72 million boxes. Processors were locked into long-term contracts with Mexico and Brazil because they didn’t expect the rebound. What followed early in the 2019-2020 season were high inventories of juice and processors not offering contracts for the season, or offering them at reduced pricing. Meanwhile, retail OJ sales continued a downward trend. It was the perfect storm for a terrible market.

While many Florida growers had multi-year contracts with juice processors that helped shield them from the market upheaval, some producers were hung out in a bad market scenario — among them were a number of larger players. And even some growers with long-term deals left a portion of their crop uncommitted to take advantage of price upswings.

As a result of low citrus prices, there were reports that some growers were cutting back on their production programs to save money until prices return to break-even or better.

Some speculate that might have shown up in the final USDA crop estimate of 67.65 million boxes for 2019-2020.

However, Coronavirus has helped turn the market in a more positive direction. While food service tanked during the shutdown, retail sales of orange juice soared.

“The lingering effects of COVID-19 continue to provide robust demand for vitamin C-rich oranges, grapefruit, tangerines, and lemons. This demand, combined with reduced supply, should help improve pricing this season.”

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Wild turkeys see in color and have an excellent daytime vision that is three times better than a human’s eyesight and covers 270 degrees. They have poor vision at night, however, and generally become warier as it grows darker.

Because it is a native bird with a proud demeanor and protective instincts, the wild turkey was Benjamin Franklin’s preference for the national bird. Benjamin Franklin considered the bald eagle less honorable because it can be a scavenger and will rob other birds and animals for prey.

The average American eats 18 pounds of turkey every year, and more turkeys are consumed on Thanksgiving than on Christmas and Easter combined.

The first unofficial presidential pardons were granted to domestic turkeys in 1947. Since then every president has “pardoned” two birds (a presidential turkey and a vice-presidential turkey) before Thanksgiving. The pardoned birds live out their days on different farms and are often put on display temporarily for the American public to greet.

Source: The Spruce