By Clint Thompson
Florida strawberry growers are ready to turn the page following last year’s season. Hurricane Milton’s impact in the region in early October 2024 led to a challenging production year, says Nick Wishnatzki, public relations director at Wish Farms in Plant City, Florida.
“All the growers in Florida are ready to turn the page from last year. It was really challenging from the hurricane, obviously, disrupting our field prep, but it also stunted the growth of the plants with all of the salt that was in the soil. It took us a while to kind of figure out that formula to be able to move forward from an input position,” Wishnatzki said. “We’re very excited about the season.”
There are multiple factors at play in fueling Wishnatzki’s optimism. One is the fact that Nov. 30 is the end of tropical season. With no storms or hurricanes impacting Florida this year, strawberry growers appear to have made it through the early season unscathed.
Also, new varieties released by the University of Florida Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences provide hope for the industry.
“We think these new varieties that are coming out from the University of Florida, particularly the Ember and Encore varieties, they’re really great in size and flavor, and also there’s some hopeful things with disease resistance as well,” Wishnatzki said.
“We’re ready to turn the page and feel like we have a real good varietal mix this year. We’ve got a good plan. We’ve got our plants in the ground as early as we’ve ever gotten them. Knock on wood, we’ve got only a couple of weeks left of hurricane season. Looks like we might dodge a bullet this year and get lucky.”