Issue link: http://read.dmtmag.com/i/34759
“Even though they are somewhat smaller than fruit from California, Above: Trees are grown in clean-tilled orchards irrigated with microjet sprinklers and trained to the open vase system. Right: Workers thin peaches to space, and more than half the potential crop hits the orchard floor. Trees are kept to a height where a worker can reach the top with no more added height than provided by a five-gallon plastic pail. “I have a great team,” Carr said. “We all work and play together.” Carr’s father, Chalmers Carr, Jr. (nicknamed Hap), is a retired Air Force general who manages the packing house with military discipline during the peach packing season. From his glass-walled office, he can see the packing line and workers, and monitor the computerized sorting equipment. “He sees things in black and white. That’s the way it has to be in quality control and in food safety,” Carr said about his dad. The key to quality control is to ruthlessly throw out poor fruit, Carr says, and the 55 to 60 female H-2A work- ers from Mexico do it. “They’re the last ones to touch the peaches,” he said. “We try to do our best out in the field, but what they do in the packing shed makes all the difference. “Women are more attuned to quality,” he said. “It hurts to throw away fruit—that’s why I don’t go out there—and we throw out 18 to 20 percent, but we have fewer than 1 percent of our loads rejected.” Lori Anne manages the office. Records are kept on orders, shipments, and the individual performance of 470 H-2A employees, most from Mexico, and 50 others. “We pay piece rate on everything we can—pruning, thinning, picking,” said Amancio Palma, the manager of field labor operations for Titan Farms. Good workers can make more than $200 a day, well more than the $9.12 wage guaranteed to them, he said. www.goodfruit.com Palma has worked at Titan Farms for 19 years, since before the Carrs bought it. He starts work at four each morning and stays until the work is done for the day. He supervises all the field operations, including planting, pruning, thinning, and harvesting. Two other farm managers, Jason Rodgers and Dwight Harmon, share the responsibilities of land cultivation and preparation, crop protection, planting, worker protection, irrigation, and land and wildlife management. The Carr’s two children, Chalmers IV, 14, and Carly Anne, 13, work on the farm when their school schedules allow. Carr’s mother’s family grew fruits and vegetables in North Carolina, where Chalmers III worked during the summer, and later gave him the connection to manage and buy a farm in Florida. He graduated from Clemson University, where he majored in agricultural economics. Innovation When Carr sees a new practice he thinks will work on the farm, he adopts it quickly. This spring, he planted 200 acres of peaches on berms—based on Clemson plant pathologist Dr. Guido Schnabel’s research findings that trees could survive oak root rot (Armillaria) if planted that way and then the soil removed from the tree collar area (see “Peaches on Ridges.”) they are sweeter.” —Chalmers Carr III He’s put trickle irrigation on about 80 percent of his peach blocks now. The farm has 26 irrigation ponds. Water is delivered by 11-gallons-per-hour microjet sprinklers. “Water is the key to growing a healthy tree that will produce great-tasting, large fruit,” he said. “Microjet sprinkler is the best way to put water out, the most con- servative way to do it. We don’t have good water wells, so we use surface water and ponds. We have to manage the water resource very carefully.” Carr has tried, but hasn’t adopted, orchard platforms, perpendicular V orchard designs, or mechanical thinners. He’s stayed with the open-vase, five-scaffold training system. “We recently leased acreage having some quad V trees,” Carr said, “but that system has never worked well for us.” He’s stayed with the 16 by 20 feet and 15 by 19 feet spacings, with 140 to 150 trees per acre, limiting tree height to eight to nine feet and minimizing ladder use. All trees are pruned twice a year. Summer pruning is used to open the trees to sunlight and obtain better color. Winter pruning is done to keep all trees to a height where a worker can pick or thin more trees from the ground. The Ridge Titan Farms is located on “The Ridge,” one of three peach-growing areas in South Carolina. Located where the Coastal Plains and its sandy soils meet the clay soils of the Piedmont, The Ridge is about 650 feet in elevation and water flows to two watersheds, dropping about 200 feet from top to bottom. The elevation and air flow reduce the risk of spring frost damage. Clean cultivation with herbicides is used in all the orchards, not only to provide a good working surface and to reduce insect damage but to reduce frost risk and competition for water and nutrients. Bloom occurs in mid-March, and frost risk continues to April 5 or so. • GOOD FRUIT GROWER JULY 2011 17 ELAINE LEHNERT RICHARD LEHNERT RICHARD LEHNERT