marks 50 years of Field Days
In 1952, not long after the state of North Carolina purchased the 366-acre farm of C. Wayland Spruill as a peanut test farm, an inspection tour and meeting were held at the farm. The next year, the event would become the Peanut Field Day.
Fifty years later, the field day is still held each fall at the Peanut Belt Research Station near Lewiston-Woodville. This year’s field day included a 50th anniversary celebration for the field day itself and for the research station.
The Peanut Field Day is a popular social event in the rural Bertie County town, where hundreds of producers and townsfolk turn out for meetings, education and a bounteous catered lunch.
The peanut industry, like all of North Carolina agriculture, has seen many changes in the past 50 years. At the 1952 field day, researchers from North Carolina State University – then N.C. State College – spoke of the importance of crop rotation and the right fertilizers for Eastern North Carolina’s potash-deficient soils.
N.C. State faculty members recommended row spacing of 24 inches for optimal yields. They described tests of new peanut varieties.
Dr. David Jordan, Extension peanut specialist in N.C. State’s crop science department, said while some peanut production issues have changed in 50 years, others remain the same. Fertilizers are better, although proper plant nutrition will always be an issue for producers, he said.
Crop rotation is still important, especially for peanut growers, Jordan said. Today’s peanut varieties are more pest- and disease-resistant. And mechanization has greatly simplified the production and harvest of peanuts.
Peanuts, once dried in stacks in the fields, had to be separated from dried vines with the use of a “pea picker.” It was a dirty, time-consuming process.
Robert Harrell of Chowan County’s Albemarle Learning Center, an institution for teaching the public the history of agricultural practices, demonstrated the “pea picker” for this year’s field day participants.
During his childhood, Harrell remembered, growers from around his family farm would converge to pick peanuts on each other’s farms. When one farm was completed, they’d move on to another. Large meals and story-telling followed a long day of picking, he recalled.
Peanuts are still dug and partially dried in fields, but today they are combined and dried by forced-air heat in specially designed trailers, Jordan said.
The field day also included a demonstration of all peanut varieties released since 1948, including NC 1 and 2, the first varieties released by N.C. State. NC 7, the dominant peanut variety for many years, was developed by N.C. State peanut breeder Dr. Johnny Wynne, now director of the N.C. Agricultural Research Service.
At this year’s field day, afternoon field tours showed the contrast between yesterday’s peanut production and today’s newest peanut problem, tomato spotted wilt virus. Tomato spotted wilt virus is a relatively new problem for growers, Jordan said. He and graduate student Christie Hurt showed growers a demonstration field where different strategies for virus control were used this summer.
Growers also were concerned about how peanut marketing and production will change when the peanut price-support program dating to 1938 is replaced with a market-oriented approach in the 2002 Farm Bill.
Jerry Hamill, president of the N.C. Peanut Growers Association, told growers he was “long on questions and short on answers” about the new peanut program. “The program we knew was dismantled, and we have little idea of the specifics of the new program,” said Dell Cotton, manager of the Peanut Growers Cooperative Marketing Association.
In a long-standing tradition, the Peanut Growers’ Association recognized growers with highest yields last year. Jordan says that photos from the field day’s early years show that high-yield growers were recognized then.
Jordan gave his annual average yield estimate — 2,650 pounds per acre – amidst shouts of “that’s what you said last year.”
The field day also included a tribute to Dr. Jack Bailey, N.C. State professor and Extension plant pathologist with peanut responsibilities, who died in April.
After a morning
of business, speeches and recognition, Peanut Field Day participants
enjoyed a lunch of barbecue, fried fish and shrimp under the shade of
the station’s stately oaks.
—
Natalie Hampton
