• By David Jordan • Peanuts planted in June will need all the help they can get in order to make a crop in a timely manner. If August, September, and October are like 2018, we should have plenty of heat units and moisture to mature a late-planted crop. But this is not a given. We could have a cooler summer, ... Read More »

Hot, dry weather is causing issues for South Carolina peanut production, and Clemson Extension peanut specialist Dan Anco warns farmers to be on the lookout for a host of diseases that could affect yields. One disease is Aspergillus crown rot. “This disease shows up as black sooty spores at the crown of dead plants,” Anco says. “It is difficult to ... Read More »

Peanut producers voted overwhelmingly to continue the Peanut Promotion, Research and Information Program administered by the National Peanut Board in a referendum conducted by the U. S. Department of Agriculture,  April 15-May 3. In the referendum, 93% of peanut producers voting were in favor of continuing the program. In order for the continuance referendum to pass, a majority of eligible ... Read More »

Keep the crop clean through the first weeks to maintain peanut yield. Weed management is truly a year-round process. It may begin in planning before the crop is planted, but it really never ends. The harvesting of the crop may only signal the start of field record keeping, where weed problems and successes are documented. Since this is the start ... Read More »

How to recognize and manage this microscopic predator. By Zane Grabau, University of Florida, Extension Nematologist and Assistant Professor Most agriculture professionals recognize that plant-parasitic nematodes can drag down peanut yield. In the Southeast, peanut nematodes are often assumed to be peanut root-knot nematodes (Meloidogyne arenaria and Meloidogyne javanica) because they are widespread, highly damaging and their symptoms are relatively ... Read More »

As the 2019 peanut crop gets planted, markets remain quiet. Buyers are aware that carry forward numbers are high and so there is no urgency to book any additional peanuts. Buyers at home and abroad are open to offers of 2019 crop, but most shellers are off the market as farmers are unwilling to contract at the sheller’s offer of ... Read More »

Every now and then, this weed emerges to remind producers it can be quite a formidable foe. Tropical spiderwort, also called Benghal dayflower, is a weed that came on the row-crop production scene in the early 1990s and continues to crop up from time to time. Although Palmer amaranth became the weed garnering most of the attention in the last ... Read More »

I feel extremely blessed to be the editor of Peanut Grower and to have been able to do this working remotely from my home all these years. This has only been accomplished because of my access to reliable Internet. For years, I have used Digital Subscriber Line (DSL) to get a high-speed bandwidth connection, which goes over the phone line ... Read More »

1. Field Selection / Rotation: Peanuts require well-drained land and do best on soils with a sandy surface. Avoid fields with recent soybean history as best you can and eliminate from future rotation. Sustainable production requires a minimum of two years, three are better, of cotton or corn, not legumes, in between peanut crops. 2. Soil test: P and K ... Read More »

2018 Peanut Crop Value According to USDA’s National Agricultural Statistics Service, the price of peanuts averaged $0.214 per pound ($428 ton) last season, 6.5 percent lower than 2017. The value of the 2018 peanut crop at farm level is $1,155,709,000, a 29.3 percent decrease from 2017. Harvested peanut acres were down 22 percent. The highest average price was paid in ... Read More »