DATE: 8/17/2005

CONTACT: Dr. Jay Chapin, (803) 284-3343, ext. 226

WRITER: Tom Lollis, (803) 284-3343, ext. 241

Clemson to host Peanut Field Day Sept. 1 at Edisto REC

BLACKVILLE – Good management and good luck will be the keys to a good peanut crop in South Carolina this year, according to Clemson University.

“If we can get timely rain this month, control fungal diseases, and can still find the rows in September, we should have a good crop,” said Jay Chapin, Clemson Extension peanut specialist.

South Carolina farmers have planted around 59,000 acres of peanuts this year, at least 58,000 of them to be harvested as dry nuts and the rest being grown as green peanuts for boiling.

Many of the growers will be at Edisto Research and Education Center Sept. 1 for the annual Peanut Field Day to hear updates on research into management practices, insect and disease problems. The day begins at 9:30 a.m. Field tours start at 10 a.m. and the program winds up with a noon lunch.

Producers who are interested in cotton and soybean research may stay for an afternoon program devoted to those crops.

Chapin said that peanut plots include an expanded variety trial and tests for control of white mold, leaf spot, cylindrocladium black rot (CBR) and thrips/tomato spotted wilt virus.

Work is also being done on inoculants for new and rotated land, seed treatments, nutrient supplements, reduced input, digging dates, peg strength and threecornered alfalfa hopper.

“Our new weed scientist, Chris Main, has some weed control plots at Blackville, too,” Chapin said. “We can’t look at everything, so we will pick out whatever looks most interesting and focus on where we can learn the most.”

Growers with early-planted peanuts, the first week of May, are invited to bring a couple of row feet for pod-blasting maturity checks.

Orangeburg is the top peanut-producing county with 15,509 acres, about 26 percent of the state’s production. The rest of the top 10 counties are: Calhoun (9,188 acres), Dorchester (4,249), Hampton (4,133), Willliamsburg (4,116), Bamberg (3,545), Barnwell (3,532), Allendale (2,817), Lee (2,110) and Sumter (1,499).

END