By Clint Thompson
Summer is winding down across the Southeast. Georgia’s specialty crop producers will remember this year to be a mostly wet and hot summer, though, those conditions vary throughout the state.
The increased rainfall caused tremendous scab pressure in some pecan orchards. The heat also reduced potential harvests for some of the watermelons produced.
Pam Knox, University of Georgia (UGA) Extension agricultural climatologist, talked about the summer weather conditions growers have endured.
“I think if you look at the summer as a whole, it has been wetter than normal. There have been some dry spells in that time period. Some people have had to do some supplemental irrigation. Of course, the big thing is it’s also been hotter than normal for a lot of the summer. That builds up more demand for water with evapotranspiration from the crops,” Knox said.
“We definitely have seen this pattern like day after day of severe weather with storms blowing through and rain associated with that, although it’s very spotty.”
According to the UGA Weather Network, Tifton, Georgia, received 15.43 inches of rain from June 1 to Aug. 10. That’s compared to 14.77 last year and 7.7 in 2020. By comparison, Moultrie, Georgia, received 9.83 inches of rain during that same timeframe, compared to 14.08 last year and 24.93 in 2021. In Watkinsville, rain totaled 15.93 inches this summer, compared to 8.88 last year and 8.45 in 2021.