Trade term
The drencher, and the treatment nobody sees
A drencher soaks fruit in a fungicide solution as it arrives from the field, before anyone grades or sizes it. It is the first thing that happens to the crop and the step furthest from the buyer, which is why it rarely appears in a conversation that is otherwise detailed about everything else.
The figures
| When it happens | On arrival from the field, before grading |
|---|---|
| Purpose | Reduce post-harvest decay |
| Visibility to the buyer | None on the fruit itself |
What it changes on an order
You have residue limits to meet
What is applied here counts toward them, and it is applied before anyone decides which fruit is yours.
You are auditing a supply chain
This step is where the paperwork often thins out, because it happens before the lot exists as a lot.
You buy for a programme with treatment restrictions
Ask about it specifically. A question about post-harvest treatment is often answered about the packing line and not about the drencher.
What this note does not settle
- We have not confirmed our own post-harvest handling, and this note describes the practice rather than ours.
- Permitted substances and their limits are set by residue law and change; this note does not list them.
Source: Regulation (EC) No 396/2005 on maximum residue levels
The first treatment lands before anyone grades the fruit
Fruit comes in from the orchard in bins and goes under a drencher, a cascade of fungicide solution that soaks an entire delivery within hours of its arrival. This happens before grading. It happens before sizing. Everything in the bin takes it, including the fruit a grader will later throw away, and that ordering is what makes the drencher worth a buyer's attention: it is the earliest point at which a residue history is written for a whole intake rather than for the fruit you will receive.
The hurry has a reason behind it. Green mould enters through wounds made while picking, and the hours immediately after harvest are when that infection is stopped most cheaply. A packhouse waiting for packing day has lost the window. Fruit destined for any kind of storage therefore meets its first chemical treatment before it has been graded, weighed or assigned to anybody's order.
Where the recirculating tank starts to matter
Drench solution is recirculated, so it accumulates spores, soil and plant debris from every bin that passed through before yours. Packhouses manage that with filtration and renewal schedules, and the schedule is a fair question for a buyer with a hygiene specification. It also explains how two lots treated in the same week with the same product behave differently once they reach your cold room.
Three answers are worth having in writing: whether the fruit went under a drencher, what was in the tank, and what was applied later on the packing line. Those are separate treatments with separate residues, and one question about fungicide collects only one of them. Our handling after harvest is unconfirmed, and the datasheets leave that field open rather than guessing at it.
Talk to the grower
Tell us the variety, the sizes and the delivery week you need. You get a delivered price and what we can commit to in writing, from the person who picks the fruit.
The grower handles enquiries. Response times are still to be confirmed.