The Baytown Sun (Baytown, Tex.), Vol. 81, No. 223, Ed. 1 Sunday, July 6, 2003 Page: 15 of 87
This newspaper is part of the collection entitled: The Baytown Sun and was provided to The Portal to Texas History by the Sterling Municipal Library.
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Sunday, July 6,2003
State
ByTABADGER
The Associated Press t
ROUND MOUNTAIN, Texas t-
Peach growers Paul and Sherry
Jenkins have endured more, than their
fair share of growing pains this year.
First there was a winter drought, and
then hailstorms. A late-March freeze
ravaged their budding peach cropland
then a few weeks ago, a freak tornado
turned some 500 of their trees into
scattered brush.
But when visitors drop by the
Jenkins’ small stand in Round
Mountain, on U.S. 281 north of
Johnson City, they do find peaches.
But barely 20 percent of their normal
crop survived the weather to grow into
sweet, fleshy fruit.
“We’ve had everything that could
possibly go wrong go wrong this
year,” Paul Jenkins said, “except we
didn’t get wiped out completely.”
The same can’t be said about 25
miles away in Stonewall, just east of
Fredericksburg and the heart of Hill
Country peach production.
Vogel Orchards, a three-generation
family operation, is making peach pre-
serves, peach butter and peach ice
cream, just as it does every year. But
the fruit going into the jars is being
trucked in from Round Mountain and
other parts of the state.
“We had a 99.9 percent loss,” said
Terri Vogel, who oversees the roadside
stand on U.S. 290. “I had five girls
hired to help me run the retail part of
it, but we could only keep two of them,
and they’re only part-time.”
A hard freeze on March 30 is to
blame for the crop’s demise.
Temperatures in some areas dropped
into the teens that night, blackening
the tiny peach blooms.
The fuzzy fruit is a big part of the
local identity in Gillespie County,
where about 40 percent of Texas’
peach acreage — about 1,500 acres —
is found.
Normally this time of year, Hill
Country tourists crowd the roadside
'huts and orchards bustle with large
numbers of seasonal workers filling
boxes 4nd baskets with newly ripened
peaches to satisfy demand.
But most of the stands along the
highways are idle this summer, and out
among the trees, small crews tend to
pruning, spraying and other tasks typ-
ically done when the harvest rush is
over.
Jim Kamas, a peach specialist with
Texas A&M Cooperative Extension,
said experienced growers have been in
this spot before — the state’s peach
crop is wiped out every seven years,
on average. The last time it occurred
was 1996.
“But the new growers haven’t taken
it on the chin before,” said Kamas,
based in Fredericksburg. “I talk to the
veterans and they say, ‘I’m going
fishing’, but the other guys, they’re
scrambling.”
Kamas said conservatively estimat-
ed the annual yield for peaches in
Gillespie County is roughly $8,000
per acre. At 100 percent failure, the
loss would run about $12 million.
Crop insurance is limited, he said,
but savvy growers stay mindful of the
cycles. “They set back some assets (in
better years) to cover years like this.”
And while the peaches are gone this
year, they’re not forgotten.
In late June, the annual Stonewall
Peach Jamboree went off as scheduled,
with two nights of rodeo, live music
and the selection of the Peach Queen
and her three duchesses.
Ernie Loeffler, director of the
Fredericksburg Convention and
Visitors Bureau, said peaches aren’t as
important to the area’s tourism indus-
try as they were a decade ago. Visitor
numbers have steadily climbed
through good peach years and bad.
“Peaches are just one part of the
mix,” he said, but added, “I’m sure
there are a lot of disappointed visitors
Associated Press photo/Eric Gay
PAUL JENKINS stands with some of the
few peaches harvested from his family
orchard in Round Mountain June 23.
at this time.”
Not only aren’t peaches as vital ,to
the regional economy anymore,
they’re also less critical fo many of the
people who grow them.
Gary Marburger, who runs a pick-
your-own orchard south of
Fredericksburg, said he’s planting
more vegetables and other fruits on his
25 acres. Having other crops will pro-
vide some income, and it will allow
him to keep his field hands.
This year he has two laborers on the
payroll, half as many as normal, and
he’s cutting costs by occasionally hir-
ing them out to neighbors.
The goal this year, he said, is simply
to cover his expenses.
“Rarely is there a perfect year," he
said. “If I was in it for the money, I’d
be looking for something else.”
Associated Press photo/Eric Gay
PAUL JENKINS shows one of the few peaches in his family orchard in Round
Mountain June 23. The Jenkins' lost about 80 percent of their peach crop to winter
drought, hailstorms, a tornado and a late-March freeze.
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Cash, Wanda Garner. The Baytown Sun (Baytown, Tex.), Vol. 81, No. 223, Ed. 1 Sunday, July 6, 2003, newspaper, July 6, 2003; Baytown, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth1051924/m1/15/?q=%22%22~1: accessed July 17, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu.; crediting Sterling Municipal Library.