Picking peaches these days is tough. But the peaches themselves should be fine — and plentiful. Near daily rainfall over the past two weeks has left midstate peach growers struggling to get their crop to the shed, but so far they have met the challenge. "It's been kind of unprecedented, the number of days of rain we have had," said Robert Dickey, owner of Dickey Farms in Crawford County. "I don't know what normal is anymore." Although too much rain can cause disease and impact peach quality, Dickey said the biggest problem has been the picking process. Wet weather can cause equipment to get stuck. There is a narrow window to pick a crop, and even a day of delay can be too much. But Dickey said so far his operation has not lost any crop due to the rain — though workers have had to do some picking in the rain. Jeff Cook, county agent for Peach and Taylor counties, said harvesting has been the biggest problem for all of the growers. Rain has caused some bacterial disease on the leaves, but he said it has not significantly hurt the peaches. Peaches are probably the most watched crop in Middle Georgia because they are labor intensive, and the growers employ hundreds of people. And people really love peaches. Row crops such as cotton, peanuts and soy beans could face bigger trouble. Cook estimated that about 40 percent of row crops that should have been planted by now have not been planted due to wet fields. Farmers were first delayed in early May because the fields were too dry, but once it started raining in mid-May precipitation has fallen almost daily. Cook said some farmers had been able to plant in the past few weeks but most have not. Much of the spring wheat crop that should have been harvested already is still sitting in the fields. The wheat could go bad if fields don't dry up enough to allow harvesting, Cook said. Farmers are also up against planting date deadlines to get the full benefit of crop insurance, from May 31 to June 15, depending on the crop. Cotton not planted by May 31, for example, would not be eligible for full insurance. For peanuts the deadline is June 5 and for soybeans it's June 15. Insurance aside, if some crops can't get planted soon, it could be too late to get a crop for the year. "We really need some sunshine, and we really need to get back in the fields and get some things planted," Cook said. As of Wednesday, the weather station in Byron had recorded 13 days of rain since May 15. The extended forecast on Thursday called for a 20 percent or higher chance of rain every day through Sunday. Dooly County is usually the state's largest cotton grower, with 70,000 acres planted, and that title should be rock solid this year. Ronnie Barentine, county agent, said because of the large number of acreage there, cotton growers get started planting early. They had about 80 percent of the crop planted when the rains hit, while other growers in the state had only about half their crop planted, Barentine said. About half of the Dooly County acreage is irrigated, so that helped with early May planting. Issues remain in Dooly, where farmers are still left with 20 percent of the cotton crop unplanted. Barentine said it needs to get planted by June 10 for maximum yield. A bigger issue could be weed control, particularly the notoriously tough pig weed. Farmers haven't been able to get in the wet fields with their sprayers, and once the weeds get over about three inches tall, they are tough to kill. That means cotton farmers could be forced to pay workers to remove the weeds by hand before harvest because the weeds interfere with the harvesters. For various reasons, Barentine said, aerial spraying doesn't work well for herbicides. So while overall Dooly is in better shape than other counties, Barentine said it's critical to get some sunshine in the next two weeks. "We are usually praying for rain, but right now we are praying for sunshine," he said. Source - http://www.macon.com