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Weather delaying specialty crop production

Excessive rain has delayed the spring planting routine for Rendleman Orchards located in the Ozarks of southern Illinois.

“It has been extremely stressful and I can’t remember us ever being actually this late.”

Wayne Sirles tells Brownfield they grow 200 acres of fruit that are two weeks behind and 60 acres of vegetables that are a month behind.  

“We just started planting some of our vegetables that we usually would have had done about the third week of April.”

He tells Brownfield his biggest concern is how the delays will impact sales.

“We have a niche market that we try to sell after the southern states start producing and before the very northern states start producing, so I don’t know how that marketing is going to affect us.”

And he says it might be harder to hire workers for a later harvest.

Interview with Wayne Sirles

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