By Clint Thompson
The Georgia Fruit and Vegetable Growers Association (GFVGA) does not have a full scope on the damage left by Hurricane Helene last week. But it knows it was devastating and widespread.
Fall crops were in the ground. Blueberry bushes were vulnerable and so were citrus and pecan trees. Chris Butts, executive director of the GFVGA, talked about the crops that were most impacted when Helene moved through the region Thursday night and early Friday.
“It’s a surprisingly busy time when everybody’s doing fall crops now. What we’re hearing are varying degrees of damage, from (crops) being ripped out of the ground and washed away; tomatoes, beans and other stuff that’s been staked. You’ve got acres of staked vegetables that are now laying on the ground. You have no power to irrigate,” Butts said. “As wet as it was, those plants can’t go more than a few days without water. There’s a race to see what can be salvaged and what can be harvested. There’s going to be a lot of losses in peppers, tomatoes, squash, zucchini, greens and if anybody’s already got cabbage in the ground. Anything that people had in the ground for fall has been damaged to some degree.
“Blueberries were hit really hard. It was kind of that area to the east where I think it got into areas that weren’t expecting to be hit all that hard. South of (Tifton) and then east; blueberry country just got hammered, all the way over into Lyons and Vidalia. They got rocked really hard. I just don’t think they were expecting it which makes it even worse.”
Peaches Spared
One facet of specialty crop production that appears to have survived the ferocious winds and widespread flooding that accompanied Helene’s presence was the peach crop.
“One blessing is middle Georgia, Warner Robins, I think peaches were largely spared. But even talking with Drew Echols up in Jaemor (Farms) he got nine and a half inches of rain. He didn’t suffer any great losses, but that’s a lot of water,” Butts said.