Georgia-Based Recommendations for Fertilization

Georgia citrus growers need fertilizer recommendations that are specific to the state’s production. This would allow growers to make better decisions concerning crop management.

That is one of the reasons Mary Sutton, University of Georgia (UGA) assistant professor and citrus Extension specialist, was hired in August 2024. She is conducting research that will benefit Georgia growers who need to mostly steer clear of Florida’s citrus fertilization recommendations. Sutton highlighted her research during the Citrus Grower’s Summer Update meeting earlier this month in Valdosta, Georgia.

“A lot of Florida’s recommendations were developed with their super sandy, sugar sand in mind, whereas Georgia has a lot loamier soil. Those are very different soil chemistries,” Sutton said. “The amounts of fertilizer that we’re putting down, a lot of it sticks in the soil instead of running off, like it would in Florida. That is enough right there to say we need our own recommendations.”

Sutton emphasized that Georgia producers have already started to back off from some of the University of Florida Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences fertilizer recommendations since the amounts were having adverse effects on trees.

“Nitrogen is a big one, I’ve heard. People are reigning it in because they were having issues with fruit staying too green. There was way too much vegetative growth for the size trees that they were wanting,” Sutton said. “People are recognizing that they’re going to have to change things up. But each grower is different on what they’re doing.”

Sutton is conducting a nitrogen study with four different application rates under evaluation. The Florida-recommended amount is the research control with one rate that is higher and two rates that are lower. The research began with nitrogen this season and will expand to include phosphorus and potassium next season.