By Clint Thompson
Most of Georgia’s blueberry production survived the late January freeze and is expected to have a bumper crop when harvesting commences in a month.
Chris Reighberg, Colquitt County blueberry producer, shared that assessment when discussing the aftermath of the freeze event on Jan. 30.
“We didn’t have freeze protection and we may have lost 10% at most. I’m kind of off the beaten path, because I’m in southwest Georgia and most of the blueberries are in southeast Georgia. The growers that I’ve consulted with over in east Georgia, I was at a farm last week that had all early varieties; Rebel, Optimus; it looks like they may have had, on the conservative side 6% to 8% loss,” Reighberg said. “I don’t think it’s going to be as near as bad of a loss as we initially anticipated. Some farms did get hit a little harder. For the most part, knock on wood, we have made it through.”
There is projected to be major production for growers with a crop this year, and it should be ready for harvest earlier than normal.
“I think (production) looks very heavy this year in Georgia. I’m thinking the markets are going to be overloaded,” he added. “Most of the farms I’ve been on checking bees in the past week, they look like we’re about three weeks ahead. We’ll be scrapping fruit probably at the end of this month. We’ll picking full on in the field by the first week in April. We initially had our labor coming up April 15. We just rescheduled that for April 1.”