| A few years ago, Steve Wilson bought several wind machines to generate enough heat to protect his crop. Some farmers laughed. Others wished they had followed his lead.
“I think we paid for those machines the first year we had them — on just one night when we turned them on during freezing
temperatures,” said Millard, who is Wilson’s son-in-law. “We’ve had no regrets about buying them.”
Gary Gray, Chilton County’s Extension System Agent, credits the county’s annual peach production to “climate, topography, soil and people.”
“Chilton County’s hilly land and high elevations are well-suited to peach production because the hilltops provide warmer orchard locations for protection against spring frosts as the heavier, colder air naturally drains away from the hilltops to the lower elevations,” Gray said.
During the past decade, several of the county’s largest peach producers have built large retail operations along Interstate 65 — luring hungry customers heading to and from Alabama’s beaches from as far away as Canada.
The two most popular attractions are Millard’s Durbin Farms site and one nearby at Peach Park where brothers-in-law Mark Gray and Allen Hathcock run that operation.
The two families have made peach production fun. Their stores sell everything from peaches to T-shirts, from homemade ice cream to pies, cakes and vegetables.
“Our early varieties are looking really good this year,” said Mark Gray. “Everybody’s talking about a bumper crop and I don’t see why we can’t have one.”
Peach production means hundreds of jobs during the spring and summer. They include clerks who work at roadside stands and peach pickers hired from throughout the area. Several hail from Mexico.
Millard, who co-owns Durbin Farms with his wife, Christy, said contract employees from Mexico are “legal immigrants” who rely on their earnings in Chilton County to help support their families back home.
“They work here half the year and spend the other half back in Mexico,” he said. “Since we began hiring them, about half have become American citizens. We couldn’t do without them.”
Chilton County produces about 75 different varieties of peaches each year. Millard said
Loring, Bounty and Majestic varieties, which bloom in July, are among the most popular peaches produced in the county.
“The best are freestone peaches,” he said. “They usually are ready for picking in late June.”
Gary Gray has been Chilton County’s chief cheerleader each spring when the peach crop begins to take shape. He ranks them with the best in the country because “they’re tree-ripened as long as possible before harvest and picked ripe.”
“Unlike apples and pears which easily ripen off the tree, peaches never improve in sugar content after harvest,” Gray said. “However, sugar content increases daily as a peach ripens on the tree, so the longer they ripen on the tree and receive more sunshine, the sweeter they taste. Sunshine makes the difference.”
Gray said a medium sized peach contains about a third of the recommended daily allowance of Vitamin A that is necessary for good eyesight. He said Vitamin A also helps the body resist infection by helping keep the lining of the mouth, nose, throat and digestive tract healthy.
Chilton County celebrates its favorite fruit every June with a Peach Festival. The highlight is picking the best peaches at an auction where money is raised to help local charities and other worthy causes. For more information on the festival contact the Chamber of Commerce at 205-755-2400.
One of the most interested peach production spectators in the county is Eddy Lockhart, who manages the Mid-State Farmer’s Co-op in Clanton and nearby Verbena.
“We sell a lot of fertilizer and pesticide to our peach farmers,” Lockhart said. “Without peaches and cattle, we wouldn’t be here.” |
