Georgia pecan farmer faces massive loss from Hurricane Helene. Biden pays him a visit
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How another hurricane has hurt Valdosta
Valdosta, Georgia, is 75 miles inland. But in just over a year, the city has endured three hurricanes that have left lasting impact on residents. We cover the damage here.
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Just after midnight on Sept. 27, the fast-moving Hurricane Helene wiped out thousands of pecan trees and tens of thousands of pounds of pecans from Buck Paulk’s 4,100-acre pecan orchard in south Georgia.
Paulk woke up to a massively different farm. His home and family are fine, but his land is severely damaged.
“The eye came right through this area,” Paulk said.
Up to 50,000 acres of pecan orchards have been seriously damaged or destroyed, Democratic Sen. Jon Ossoff said in a press briefing Wednesday. Ossoff is leading a bipartisan effort to help farmers get more federal aid.
On the border of Lowndes and Berrien County, just 15 miles north of Valdosta, Shiloh Pecan Farm produces 4 to 5 million pounds of pecans a year.
Days before the incoming hurricane, Paulk had farm workers pick a variety called Pawnee, salvaging as much as he could.
“I’ve been hit by hurricanes and tropical storms before,” Paulk said. “It’s part of being here. But we haven’t had two of the worst in mine and my daddy’s generation, and back to back.”
Paulk lost about 15% of his trees from Hurricane Idalia in August 2023, just 13 months before Helene. After that, he decided to take advantage of hurricane insurance.
Under the USDA, Hurricane Insurance covers a portion of a deductible of an underlying crop insurance policy, in select counties throughout the Gulf Coast and Atlanta (as well as Hawaii). The program started in 2020 and covers 70 different crops.
Paulk bought the lowest amount, which covers a “catastrophic and unharvestable situation,” which he said could fit his current scenario.
“(The insurance) will help some,” he said.
A week after the storm, Paulk still didn’t have a tally of how much he’s lost and said it will take months to just get trees removed.
“The name of the game right now is getting them out of the field,” he said.
When the Ledger-Enquirer spoke to Paulk, tractors were busy grabbing trees and putting them in piles to be chipped. Paulk said he had a friend in the timber industry who had a chipping machine.
From a bird’s eye/drone view, and examining the grounds by truck, Paulk estimates anywhere from 30 to 40% of his trees have been lost and somewhere around 80% of his production is gone.
“The wind knocked out 80% of what I would have harvested,” he said.
Even trees that didn’t fall lost limbs and foliage.
Paulk pointed to a nearby standing tree and said, “That tree that lost limbs, is stressed from the storm and it’s going to be set back years,” Paulk said.
This won’t affect the consumer as much as it will the local economy and town of Ray City, Paulk emphasized.
“Even with this storm, Georgia will still make 70 million pounds of pecans this year,” he said. “We produce the most out of any state.”
In a typical year, Georgia can produce up to 88 million pounds of pecans, according to the University of Georgia Agriculture extension. And the total production in the United States hovers around 250 million pounds according to the USDA and National Agricultural Statistics Service That same report said Georgia produced 126 million pounds in 2022.
“(The effect) trickles down into this community,” Paulk said. “It’s the tractor dealership, chemical fertilizer, workforce for ag that is here, and other businesses that depend on them. Everything is affected by it. You take the farms out and you can say bye to Ray City.”
Just a day before the Ledger-Enquirer spoke with Paulk, President Joe Biden and Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack stopped at his orchard to assess damage from Helene and reassure Americans the federal government would help.
“I promise you we have your back,” Biden said during the press conference at Shiloh Pecan Farm. “We’re going to stay until you’re restored.”
Paulk said he spoke with Biden and Vilsack the day before.
“Lean into these specialty crop block grants,” he said he told them. “That would help us. It gives things to the communities and after Hurricane Michael, it helped a lot.”
On Sept. 29, the block grant request was sent to Congress by Georgia Agriculture Commissioner Tyler Harper and co-signed by state Sen. Russ Goodman.
Sen. Jon Ossoff and Rep. Austin Scott sent a similar request to Congress to urge congressional leadership to work with them to ensure disaster relief resources are made to agricultural producers.
“Farmers and growers nationwide, not only those damaged by Helene, have now faced multiple growing seasons without sufficient federal support,” the letter said. “Our constituents are counting on us to act swiftly.”
During a press briefing on Oct. 9, Ossoff said “damage assessments have to be sufficient for legislation to be written that accounts for the real need of the agriculture economy ... those assessments are ongoing. After hurricane Michael it took Congress well over a year to make these appropriations. We can’t find ourself in that position again. We also do have to have a credible and precise understanding of the extent.”
Ossoff added that he requested Vilsack allow farmers to do their own damage assessments and not wait for government officials as personnel are strained from the ongoing disasters. Vilsack OK’d this.
Paulk estimates that he could maybe get back “on top of funds” in eight to 10 years, where he’s earning a profit on the acres lost.
“There are people who really need this,” he said. “Things were already tight without the storm. I can go for a while but I have counterparts that won’t make it.”
Hurricane Helene rapidly intensified in warm Gulf waters, charging it to a Category 4 hurricane before making landfall. The strong Category 3 and Category 2 winds lasted through Paulk’s orchard, 100 miles inland.
Meteorologist Alex DaSilva at AccuWeather told the Ledger-Enquirer, “if the storm was a Category 1 or 2 you wouldn’t have the winds we had,” he said.
This story was originally published October 10, 2024 at 5:00 AM.
