US (NC): North Carolina peach season gearing up, despite frost damage
“The crop might look a little thin in some areas because of the frost and freeze this year,” said Mike Parker, a horticulture specialist at N.C. State University. But, Parker assured, “There will be peaches this summer from North Carolina.”
It’s a good thing, since imported peaches just aren’t the same, said Dexter Hill, marketing specialist with the N.C. Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services. Peaches bought out-of-state likely have been picked unripe, stored and shipped, Hill said.
“When you get it home and put it on your table, they will continue to ripen but they won’t be as sweet as a North Carolina peach,” he said. “Once you pick a peach, the sugar content stops there and it doesn’t get any higher.”
Local peaches coming into season now are called clingstone because the pit doesn’t separate easily from the fruit. They arrive early in the season, and were hurt worst by spring frosts. Semi-clingstone varieties come out a bit later, and freestone peaches are usually ready in some parts of the state by July 1.
The worst freezes came in the west. Betty and Alan Davis own a peach and apple farm in Lincoln County, northwest of Charlotte, and lost their entire crop to a freeze.
“We don’t have any peaches at all,” Betty Davis said, adding that they’re having to buy from South Carolina to have some to sell. They had a good crop last year, but coping still takes trust. You go to bed, you sleep and you forget about it, because the Lord is in control,” she said. “We are caretakers, and he takes care of putting the fruit on the tree.”
Even in the Sandhills, where the peaches are doing all right, the season is more than a week later than usual, Hill said.
“We had a really rough winter, and it set everybody back,” he said. “Just about every crop – blueberries, strawberries, peaches and row crops – it just set everybody back.”
Despite the difficulties, Hill is optimistic about this year’s harvest.
Peaches come after blueberries, which are just showing the first blushes of ripeness in the Triangle. They have been bursting since mid-May in the southern part of the state.
Harvest came about a week later than usual, according to Laura Lockney, who works at Ivanhoe Farms, with roughly 600 acres in Sampson County. The delay was weather-related.
“Once the flowers are pollinated, the berries like some warmth, and we had a little bit of a cool spell,” Lockney said, but added, “We’re doing very well.”
The blueberry season will run through July, and the peach season runs through August.
Source: newsobserver.com
