By LeiLani Golden - bio | email
THOMASVILLE, GA (WALB) – These sub-freezing temperatures are also a problem for some farmers. Strawberries can't handle extended periods of cold, and some farmers could lose their entire crop.
Scott Vann has been a strawberry farmer for 25 years. He remembers seasons when snow fell on his crops.
But never a time when extreme low temperatures stuck around for so long. "I don't' remember it staying this cold."
Vann invested a lot of time and money into his strawberry crops. And now, he could lose it all. "I have about $8,000 per acre. It's expensive. That's why I only have two acres."
Vann needed to make a choice. He could try to protect his crops from the cold by insulating them with frozen water. Or, he could do nothing and hope mother nature took care of the rest.
Because of the extended cold, Vann says he won't use sprinklers to freeze protect his crops. "We made the decision not to freeze protect this early... our berries [be] more damaged."
But he's still worried that his strawberries aren't in the clear just yet. "Don't want warm [weather] then another freeze."
Only time will tell if Vann's strawberries survive the extreme winter cold. Two months to be exact. Vann is hopeful that by harvest time in early March, he'll still have a full crop.
It's a different story for Vann's peach crop. He says that fruit can handle the extreme cold.
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