Tag: Peaches

Milder Winters Pose Potential Problems For Local Food Producers

This past winter was unseasonably mild. That’s put some of the state’s fruit farmers in an unexpectedly precarious position as plants produce before the threat of frost is gone.

This past winter was unseasonably mild. That’s put some of the state’s fruit farmers in an unexpectedly precarious position as plants produce before the threat of frost is gone.

Garry Shanholtz has been growing apple, peach and cherry trees in his Hampshire County Orchard for close to 60 years, part of a rich agricultural tradition in the state.

“Most people don’t realize what history West Virginia has in the fruit business,” he said. “Of course, the Golden Delicious apple was found in Clay County, and it’s the most widely planted apple in the world. It’s cross bred with a lot of other apples.” 

Garry said his father was also in agriculture, mostly timber and cattle, but bought land with a small orchard in the 1950s. 

“I decided to go with the orchard because them trees go to sleep in the wintertime, and I take a vacation,” he said. “You don’t have to get up to feed the cattle and so on, so forth. But it’s been a great life.”

But that downtime is starting to get shorter as temperatures warm up. This past winter wasn’t the warmest on record, but according to the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration, it did rank in the top 20 of all time. Garry’s son Kane, who helps him manage the orchard, said farmers are taking notice.

“I was at one of my farm meetings, and there was a guy there talking about the weather,” Kane said. “And he said, ‘It seems like it’s staying warmer later. And then it’s not staying as cool as long as it should, then it warms up.’ Then that’s what happens, everything pops out ahead.”

Almost three weeks ahead by the Shanholtz’s estimation.

During a visit to the orchard in mid April, the pink peach blossoms that would normally be peaking, had already come and gone. The apple orchards were wearing their white blooms, which used to not arrive until the first week of May.

“The Apple Blossom Festival in Winchester has always been the first weekend in May,” Garry said. “Well, the apple blossoms are almost gone.”

Apple trees in one of the Shanholtz orchards in full bloom, three weeks earlier than normal. Credit: Chris Schulz/West Virginia Public Broadcasting
A closeup on apple blossoms. Credit: Chris Schulz/West Virginia Public Broadcasting

In most lines of work, being ahead of schedule is usually a good thing. But for the Shanholtz and their orchard, early fruiting puts their production at risk. A freeze right now could mean a total write-off of their crop for the year.

“Right here are some peaches coming out of the shuck,” Kane said, indicating budding fruit on the branch. “So now they’re really vulnerable. If we don’t have a freeze, you know, we’re gonna have a good crop. I want it to stay warm to get through this bloom period on the apples in it, get it behind us.” 

Threats from a changing climate don’t stop there. Beyond the threat of a freeze killing off early fruit, plants like peaches, apples and cherries – all of which the Shanholtz’s grow – need what are called “chill hours” to produce. 

“The sap goes down in the fall of the year on peaches and apples and everything, and then everything stays asleep for a certain amount of hours,” Garry said. “It varies on different crops, different apples, different peaches, then once that time’s up if you get warm weather, that’s when sort of everything starts coming. And that’s been happening, everything has been coming a little sooner.”

Garry said even in a warm winter like the one we just had, West Virginia still gets plenty of chill hours to accommodate his plants, but it is starting to become a problem farther south.

“They actually plant peaches that take less hours, but we’re not close to that yet,” he said. “We’ve had enough cold weather for him to go into dormant back out. It’s just that they’re coming out of dormancy sooner.”

Dee Singh-Knights, an extension specialist of agribusiness economics and management with the WVU Extension Service, said that in economics, climate and weather fluctuations fall into the category of “wicked problems.”

“By wicked, what we mean is that it’s generally not well understood, because the data is still emerging,” she said. “It does pose significant economic burdens. We’re talking about food that is the underpinning of our society.”

The Extension Service aims to provide producers like the Shanholtz’s with both long and short-term solutions, but Singh-Knights said that has to happen on a case-by-case basis. 

“I like to say, ‘When you’re seeing one farm in West Virginia, you’ve seen one farm in West Virginia,'” she said. “That simply means that our farm operators, in terms of the vulnerabilities, every single farm operation will have different vulnerabilities on a very individual level.” 

That variety is its own sort of insurance, because Singh-Knights said food systems that will stand up to a changing environment will have to be varied in place and production. 

“Whereas we do want to have a very resilient local food system, where our small farm families continue to be profitable, to be sustainable, resilience really is making sure that we’re not putting all our eggs in one basket,” Singh-Knights said. 

Peach producers in warmer, southern regions can still provide fruit if a freeze knocks out a local crop, and vice versa if winters down south prove too mild for a good production.

“It’s about deliberate planning,” Singh-Knights said. “It’s about deliberately understanding what you’re doing in the face of climate change and making these changes so that you remain profitable.”

For now, however, Kane said all he can do is work with what’s in front of him.

“Years ago, we used to stress over the weather. But you know, when you’ve been in it as long as we have, it is what it is,” he said. “We can’t control it. So we got to take what Mother Nature gives us, and sometimes it’s good, sometimes it’s bad, you know?”

Beans, More Beans And Kentucky’s Poet Laureate

This week, climate change is changing what grows in Appalachia, and where. Some peach varieties usually found in Georgia are moving north. We also learn how the bean dish frijoles charros made its way from northern Mexico — to Appalachian Ohio.

This week, climate change is changing what grows in Appalachia, and where. Some peach varieties usually found in Georgia are moving north.

We also learn how the bean dish frijoles charros made its way from northern Mexico — to Appalachian Ohio.

And we revisit our interview with Crystal Wilkinson, who was appointed Kentucky poet laureate in 2021.

You’ll hear these stories and more this week, Inside Appalachia.

In This Episode:

Frijoles Charros Makes Its Way To Menus In Ohio

A bowl of brothy pinto beans is a comfort food for lots of folks here in Appalachia. In southeast Ohio, one man is serving up soup beans that remind him of his childhood home. Frijoles charros — or charro beans — is a popular dish among the ranching communities of rural northern Mexico. Now they’re on a menu in the former coal town of Wellston.

Folkways reporter Nicole Musgrave has this story.  

Climate Change Prunes Peach Trees Of The South

Georgia is known for its peaches. They’re practically a state symbol. 

You can find peach trees throughout the state. But now, varieties once found only in the southern part of Georgia are moving northward into Appalachia. That’s because fruit trees need a certain amount of cold weather — and climate change is resulting in milder winters and earlier springs. 

It’s not just peaches. Climate change affects all sorts of fruit — from apples and blueberries, to pawpaws, pears and plums. 

Jess Mador has this story of fruit tree migration. It begins in Georgia.

Tough Conversations About End of Life Plans

Much of Appalachia has an aging population. And with fewer services available in rural communities, it’s often left to families to care for the needs of seniors. That includes end of life care — and beyond.

But talking about funeral arrangements can be awkward. Tom Nichols is the owner of Bartlett Nichols Funeral Home in St. Albans, West Virginia. He spoke with WVPB’s Eric Douglas about ways to ease the conversation. 

Revisiting KY Poet Laureate Crystal Wilkinson

Our final segment revisits our former co-host Caitlin Tan’s 2021 interview with Crystal Wilkinson. Wilkinson was the first Black woman to be named poet laureate of Kentucky. A lot of her writing focuses on Black women and their experiences in Appalachia.

Wilkinson grew up on her grandparents’ farm in Casey County, Kentucky. Her grandfather, Silas, raised cash crops like corn and tobacco. 

Caitlin began by asking Wilkinson to read a poem. She chose an ode to Tobacco and her grandfather.

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Our theme music is by Matt Jackfert. Other music this week was provided by Town Mountain, Carolina Chocolate Drops, Sierra Ferrell, Wes Swing and Paul Loomis. 

Bill Lynch is our producer. Our executive producer is Eric Douglas. Kelley Libby is our editor. Our audio mixer is Patrick Stephens. Zander Aloi also helped produce this episode.

You can send us an email at InsideAppalachia@wvpublic.org.

You can find us on Instagram and Twitter @InAppalachia.

And you can sign-up for our Inside Appalachia Newsletter here!

Inside Appalachia is a production of West Virginia Public Broadcasting.

W.Va. Peach Season is Here, But There's Little to Harvest – Here's Why

It’s the peak of the peach season here in West Virginia, and lots of folks are clamoring to their nearby farmer’s markets to get some. But the late frost this year did a number on the state’s peach crop, and some say it was the worst frost in 30 years.

Orr’s Farm Market has been family owned for generations. It’s located in Martinsburg and has been around since 1995. But the legacy of the orchards that fuel this family market has been going strong since 1954 when it began with only 60 acres. Now, that number has increased to 1100.

“About 450 acres of it is peach trees,” said Katy Orr-Dove, Retail Market Manager at Orr’s Farm Market, “our other big crop is apples, and there are some adjoining family farms just south of us here, so it’s not all us, but a lot of it is us.”

The Orr’s say their property is home to the largest peach orchard in the state. About 15 to 20 percent of the family’s peach crop is kept and sold in-state at their farm market. The rest is sent for wholesale at various grocery stores along the East Coast.

But this year, farmers all across West Virginia, like the Orrs, saw a late frost that the state Department of Agriculture says was substantial. A department spokesman says the damage itself was hit or miss across the state, but the frost devastated many peach orchards in the Eastern Panhandle.

“It hurt all over West Virginia, the late frost,” said Walt Helmick, West Virginia’s Agriculture Commissioner, “but not like it does here. Here, this is the area that you watch the most, because this is where those industries that are dependent on frost free nights exist.”

Helmick attended Romney’s Peach Festival earlier this month. The Hampshire County Development Authority says about 2,000 people came out over the course of the weekend – celebrating the crop through song, dance, a parade, and foods like peach pie and peach ice cream.

Helmick says West Virginia is 15th in the United States for peach production with about 5,000 tons harvested on average each year. But Helmick says that’s only a quarter of what was produced at the industry’s peak in the state in the 1920s and 30s.

As for how much this year’s late frost impacted the overall productivity of the industry in West Virginia – Helmick says he’s not sure yet. But at Orr’s orchards, 60 percent of their peach crop was lost.

“From what I’ve heard from my uncle and my father, this is a once in 30-year type of a frost,” Orr-Dove said, “and so it’s not very common, and so this is the first time I’ve had to see us deal with this kind of a loss.”

That caused the price of a bushel to increase by 2 to 3 dollars at the Orr Farm Market. Orr-Dove says while there were fewer peaches on the trees, that allowed the peaches that did survive to grow larger.

“They had more room to grow on the trees since there weren’t as many,” she said, “So, you know, my customers are very happy this year, and they haven’t really noticed it; there’s a lot less wholesale going on to the grocery stores though.”

Roughly 80 percent fewer peaches are headed out from Orr’s to retailers this year. But Orr-Dove says that fact hasn’t got her family down – they’re looking forward to next year’s harvest.

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