MARBLE FALLS, Texas — Farmers across Texas are starting to get a better idea of how much damage the winter storm caused. At Sweet Berry Farm in Marble Falls, crews pulled the covers off the strawberry plants Wednesday.
They discovered a good news/bad news story. Some berries were lost in the freeze and the plants did take a hit, but the core of the plants look healthy and they are seeing some new growth that appears to have survived.
“We have some black spots on the plant, but that's OK. That just indicates that the water that was inside the leaf froze. So what we do whenever we're assessing plants is look to see if they're still green, which equals still alive. We look down in here on what are called the crowns of the plant, and that's how we can tell the plant is still growing. So the plants themselves fared pretty well,” said Lacy Garcia.
It is expected Sweet Berry Farm will open a little later this spring because of this storm, but the hope is they will have plenty of berries and even flowers to pick.
Crews also encourage you to wait a bit before tackling the plants in your yard.
PHOTOS: Sweet Berry Farm recovering after winter storms
“The best thing to do right now is just to wait. I know that's not the answer people want, but yes, we just have to wait and see kind of what happens. Keep watering your plants at home. Don't do any fertilizing or pruning right now. That just encourages your plant to grow without killing itself. So just wait for now, wait a couple of weeks at least and then see what happens. And then we can do some damage control,” said Garcia.
They said cutting things back now could shock the plants even further, preventing any future growth. So they suggest you keep watering your plants and wait a few weeks before pruning.
Sweet Berry Farms plans to keep customers updated on its social media pages, but said to look for opening information to be a little later than usual. The farm had hoped to open this weekend or next, now it will likely be later in March or April.
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