By Clint Thompson
Last week’s sub-freezing temperatures over multiple days impacted Georgia’s early peach varieties. To what extent remains to be seen, explains Jeff Cook, University of Georgia Cooperative Extension agriculture and natural resources agent for Peach and Taylor counties.
“What I saw initially, it’s going to be an impact on some early stuff. It really depends on where you were and how low you got. We had a lot of variations in what our lows were,” Cook said. “It’s going to depend on where each orchard is, what variety it is, what stage of bloom it’s at and how far along they were developed.”
Peach trees that had already started blooming were especially vulnerable to the low temperatures.
According to the UGA Weather Network, low temperatures on March 18 in Fort Valley, Georgia, dropped to 27 degrees Fahrenheit (F). That followed high temperatures the week before on March 11 in Fort Valley that reached 83 degrees F.
“We had really good chill, but we had a really warm February and definitely the first part of March. I feel like we were about 10 days ahead as far as bloom goes,” Cook said. “Nobody really seemed to pay attention to it, but we got really cold Tuesday morning (March 10) and Wednesday morning (March 11). We’re still waiting to see what that means as far as how much it’s going to affect our early-season crop.
“We were passed bloom in a lot of areas. As far as the upcoming season, we’ve definitely got peaches, it’s just a matter of how much volume do we have early.”