Today, March 21, 2018, we collected our first plum curculio of the season in one of our traps in Fort Valley. While we only found one, this indicates that plum curculio are becoming active in middle Georgia peaches, so it is time to start preparing your plum curculio management program….
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I am monitoring AgroClimate.org (http://agroclimate.org/tools/chill-hours-calculator/) as well as other sources for projected chill as of today 1/2/2018 we are around 500  hours which is nearly 100 hours behind our historic average on chill.  If you follow the projected chill probabilities we could be anywhere between 700 and 900 hours by…
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Based on observations at the Byron USDA station (pathology blocks) and Fort Valley State (Jeff Cook orchards), phony peach appears to be increasing in importance (see photos below; short, squat trees are phony peach trees).  I suspect this could be related to two really warm consecutive winters, increased vector numbers…
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Hurricane Irma passed through Georgia with strong sustained winds. For our peach trees this meant trouble, especially for younger trees (1-3 years-old). Trees could have been fully uprooted, but in general, you can see them leaning or touching the ground. Younger trees can be salvaged, but this needs to be…
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Unfortunately, it does look like Georgia will experience pretty high winds from hurricane Irma as it passes north. In addition to the direct damage to trees, tree decline and death over time can be a direct result of hurricanes and tropical storms. High winds whip young trees from side-to-side like large…
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