Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: TUESDAY, March 16, 1993 TAG: 9303160100
SECTION: BUSINESS PAGE: B7 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: BARNEY, GA. LENGTH: Medium
SOUTHERN CROPS TAKE HARSH BLOW
John DeWitt lost 40 percent of his peach crop, worth about $500,000, when the icy tail of a deadly blizzard swept through south Georgia."It makes you feel bad, but you have to go ahead with your business," said DeWitt, who grows 600 acres of peaches in Brooks County, near the Florida line.
Around the South on Monday, farmers returned to their fields to find everything from tomatoes to tobacco hit hard by the weekend storm.
The storm sent freezing temperatures and high wind as far south as central Florida, and in that state's citrus belt on Monday crews harvested oranges knocked to the ground by gale-force wind.
Because this year's orange crop is the second-largest on record, juice processors already had been working around the clock; now they'll have to go even faster.
Agriculture officials said it would be several days before they could provide firm damage estimates, but the destruction could hit the millions.
"At this point I don't want to hit a panic button, but we know there's been damage" to crops statewide, said Georgia Agriculture Commissioner Tommy Irvin.
Mississippi lost about 80 percent of its $18 million blueberry and peach crops. Thurty-five precent to 70 percent of Louisiana's $9 million strawberry crop was wiped out, and ripening produce in Florida was destroyed more by the wind than the cold.
For some crops, "it's too late to replant," he said.
It was too early to tell on Monday if Georgia's tender Vidalia onions and budding apple trees were hurt badly. The snow could have insulated the apple trees, although the zero-degree temperatures that hit north Georgia usually kill them, said grower Tim Mercier of Blue Ridge, who trudged through 20-inch snow to inspect his trees.
Ware County tobacco farmer A.J. Mixon said he lost $40,000 in profits when the wind destroyed 60 percent of his early tobacco plantings.
"I don't see where we can replace them," he said.