Post by Trade Coach on Oct 19, 2013 20:44:20 GMT 1
While green Hatch harvest winds down, red pepper harvest gears up
With the advent of cooler weather and the biological changes in pepper plants as a result, green pepper harvest is winding down now and harvesting red peppers now takes over as the primary task at hand, with early reports indicating there are still plenty of red peppers being picked and dried and sold at roadside stands and grocery stores across the Southwest.
While most green chili pepper growers in southern New Mexico say it has been a good year for their famously spicy crop, others say they suffered from heavy rains and even a few hail storms late in the season that slowed harvest and in some cases damaged their crop and slowed harvest in the fields.
But with the advent of cooler weather and the biological changes in pepper plants as a result, green pepper harvest is winding down now and harvesting red peppers now takes over as the primary task at hand, with early reports indicating there are still plenty of red peppers being picked and dried and sold at roadside stands and grocery stores across the Southwest.
In chili-rich Doña Ana County, the mega-center of chili pepper production in a state famous for chili peppers, this year's crop has been somewhat of a mixed bag.
Salem farmer Jerry Franzoy reports the harvest season started off in August under prime conditions, but with the advent September, heavy rains forced harvesters out of the fields and some plants were damaged as a result of the weather. The set back wasn't great however and resulted in a loss of "less than five percent under early harvest expectations."
But Franzoy says in spite of the heavy rains that diminished production slightly around Hatch, chili peppers fields around the Las Uvas Valley area produced peppers of excellent quality.
Source: southwestfarmpress.com/vegetables/while-green-hatch-harvest-winds-down-red-pepper-harvest-gears
With the advent of cooler weather and the biological changes in pepper plants as a result, green pepper harvest is winding down now and harvesting red peppers now takes over as the primary task at hand, with early reports indicating there are still plenty of red peppers being picked and dried and sold at roadside stands and grocery stores across the Southwest.
While most green chili pepper growers in southern New Mexico say it has been a good year for their famously spicy crop, others say they suffered from heavy rains and even a few hail storms late in the season that slowed harvest and in some cases damaged their crop and slowed harvest in the fields.
But with the advent of cooler weather and the biological changes in pepper plants as a result, green pepper harvest is winding down now and harvesting red peppers now takes over as the primary task at hand, with early reports indicating there are still plenty of red peppers being picked and dried and sold at roadside stands and grocery stores across the Southwest.
In chili-rich Doña Ana County, the mega-center of chili pepper production in a state famous for chili peppers, this year's crop has been somewhat of a mixed bag.
Salem farmer Jerry Franzoy reports the harvest season started off in August under prime conditions, but with the advent September, heavy rains forced harvesters out of the fields and some plants were damaged as a result of the weather. The set back wasn't great however and resulted in a loss of "less than five percent under early harvest expectations."
But Franzoy says in spite of the heavy rains that diminished production slightly around Hatch, chili peppers fields around the Las Uvas Valley area produced peppers of excellent quality.
Source: southwestfarmpress.com/vegetables/while-green-hatch-harvest-winds-down-red-pepper-harvest-gears