Jake Price, county Extension coordinator for Lowndes County, spoke with AgNet Citrus Industry about the annual Citrus Grower’s Summer Update meeting in Valdosta.
“We call this the Summer Update, so we let growers know of some of the projects and research that we’re doing, especially with Mary Sutton (UGA assistant professor and citrus Extension specialist),” Price said. “She’s been here a full year now and has a lot of projects going on and doing a great job out there. We let growers know what the latest is on diseases like phytophthora, and we covered tracking Asian citrus psyllid movement.
“We also had Lauren Diepenbrock, (University of Florida Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences associate professor) who came from Lake Alfred, Florida. She’s been doing a lot of research on snails. Snails are a big problem in citrus and a lot of other crops up here.”
Satsumas, which are the most widely grown citrus variety in the region, are expected to see minimal production this year after last year’s oversupply. The meeting included discussion of how to be more efficient and sustainable with production across years.
“Last year was a big year for satsuma production. It was an ‘on’ year because the previous year had a hard freeze that reset all of the trees. Last year, we had a lot of fruit,” Price said. “This year, the satsumas have very little fruit. Growers are regathering and rethinking how they’re going to do some things. Some of the other varieties we have are producing this year. I think overall, the production will be down from last year. We have less and less satsumas in Georgia every year, but the ones that we do have, we need to find a way to keep them producing more consistently.”