By Frank Giles
Last year’s citrus season was marred by continuing production declines from HLB and hurricanes. The combined effect of both dropped the final all-orange output to 15.8 million boxes. Certainly, the numbers reflected the dire situation the industry found itself in after the storms.
But after last year’s harvest, growers were given clearance to utilize new trunk-injection therapies of oxytetracycline. The much-anticipated treatments had performed well in trials, and the hope was this would translate in the real-word grove environment. Early indications are positive.
AgNet Media’s Florida Citrus State of the Industry Survey conducted this fall reflects grower optimism after many have embraced trunk injection. In addition, treatments of plant growth regulators prior to trunk injection have been deployed in groves. See some of the survey results on new therapies.
A special thanks to CYAN 365 for sponsoring the Florida Citrus State of the Industry Survey. Stay tuned for more survey results next month on planting and popular varieties and rootstocks.