A mild winter with hard spring frosts has left South Carolina blueberry farms decimated. Michael Parker from Hickory Bluff Berry Farm said: “The strawberries and blueberries were ahead of the game. We were picking strawberries at the end of January. We should be picking berries in March and April and the blueberries came in extremely early this year. Then we had the two days of frost and heavy wind and it probably added up to a 90 percent loss on our blueberries.”
They were able to save the strawberries by covering them, but because of the wind it was impossible to cover rows of tall blueberry bushes.
In Ravenel, Champney’s Blueberry Farm faired a little better, reporting loses of 75 to 85 percent. Emery Tumbleston: “A nearby farm, Newton’s Blueberry Farm, they actually experienced a colder temperature. They were around 24 degrees. They even lost new growth on their stems. Their leaves were even burned up.”
