Peanut harvest in full swing in southwest Georgia for one of state’s signature crops

NEWTON — Take a drive outside most any town in southwest Georgia, and it won’t take long before peanut pickers digging the state’s signature crop come into view. And in the air, there will come the aroma of the chemical used to defoliate cotton as farmers prepare to get harvest under way.

All of that means it’s approaching peak harvest season as peanut and cotton growers gather the year’s crops.

For peanuts, farmers had a relatively good production year, at least on irrigated acreage. On non-irrigated soil, it was a hit-or-miss proposition, with peanut growers who weren’t blessed by rain taking a hit.

“The irrigated peanuts so far have been good, and the weather has been good to pick,” Baker County farmer Shane Kelly said. “The dryland peanuts (are) poor yield, poor grade.

“Here in my area, we probably ended up with an inch of rain in August the whole month. The vines dried up; they were brown. They turned around a little when the hurricane came through.”

The damage had been baked in by that time, however, with the effects of excessive heat and little rainfall.

In Georgia, peanuts are grown in 77 counties, and about 1.45 million tons are dug out of the ground each fall, according to the Georgia Peanut Commission. There are about 4,000 peanut growers in the state, and they produce half of the worldwide total.

Southwest Georgia is at the epicenter of this production, with Mitchell County at the top. In 2021 growers there planted more than 43,000 acres, with an average yield of 4,262 tons per acre and a value of $40.68 million, according to the University of Georgia’s annual farm gate value report for that year.

Mitchell County was followed by Decatur, Worth, Miller and Early counties, and peanuts were valued in those counties at more than $776 million. Rounding out the top 10 were Seminole, Baker, Coffee, Colquitt and Bulloch counties.

A run of days with blue skies has helped farmers in this year’s harvest.

“We’ve had two good weeks of weather, so we’ve been coming along,” said Kelly, whose operation also grows corn, cotton, blueberries and pecans. “It’s full-force right now, probably to the end of October. Another two good weeks will probably put me out of the peanut (picking) business.”

Prices for farmers’ peanuts have increased a bit recently, but some also are experiencing sticker shock when it comes time to buy equipment. As is the case for the economy as a whole, prices for farm equipment have shot up, with a new tractor in the range of $400,000, Kelly said. A peanut picker can run $250,000, and a new cotton combine is in the neighborhood of $1 million.

“I usually trade two cotton pickers at a time when they get three or four years on them,” Kelly said. “Now it takes the same money to buy one that I used to buy two with.

“With these prices going up … there’s a point where there ain’t no money in it at all. That’s one of our concerns.”

Farmers expects to start defoliating cotton soon and to start picking in about two weeks.

Staff Photo: Alan MauldinAlanMauldin[email protected]
https://secure.gravatar.com/avatar/f714026fc83d6150ab9a4350b4169940?s=100&d=mm&r=gStaff Photo: Alan MauldinAlanMauldin[email protected]
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