While at the Sunbelt Ag Expo, local county Extension agents, Sydni Ingram and Kale Cloud, presented a Harvest Maturity Clinic for tour attendees. Farmers utilize the hull scrape method or pod blasting and the Peanut Profile Board to determine if peanuts have reached optimum maturity for harvest. Digging peanuts is one of the biggest decisions farmers make each year. The maturity of a peanut affects the yield, flavor, grade and shelf life. Farmers can lose as much as 500 to 700 pounds per acre in fields if peanuts are harvested too early or too late. During the tour several county agents set up stations to show attendees how to use the Peanut Profile Board.

View the 2022 Georgia Peanut Tour Photo Album

Maule Air S.T.O.L. is an aircraft manufacturer located in Moultrie, Georgia. Maule Air Inc. is owned and operated by the Maule family. Some of the Maule family, Brent Maule and his nephew Tyler Wilkes, presented their purpose and two of their planes to 2022 Georgia Peanut Tour attendees. Brent and Tyler are fourth and fifth generation aircraft manufacturers for Maule Air Inc. Maule Air Inc. take pride in the fact that their planes are take off and land within 100 feet.  Their short take off and landing make them popular within the farming community. Maule also provide room in their planes to resemble the same effect of a trunk or truck bed. Along with many other implements, Maule provides tools for landing in most locations of the world. For example, they have floats for landing in water, sleds for snow, and wheels for dry land.

Attendees were able to observe the planes Brent and Tyler brought to exhibit. Brent and Tyler, also, answered questions any of the attendees had.

View the 2022 Georgia Peanut Tour Photo Album

Chip Blalock, Executive Director of the Sunbelt Ag Expo, shared the purpose of the facility with 2022 Georgia Peanut Tour attendees. The Sunbelt Ag Expo is a trade show that focuses on agriculture at Spence Field in Moultrie, Georgia. Also known as “North America’s Premier Farm Show,” Sunbelt Ag Expo has more than 1,200 vendors and exhibitors each year. All industry members and farmers are welcomed and encouraged to attend.

The Expo sits on a 100-acre exhibit site, also neighboring a 530-acre working research farm. On this farm, Sunbelt does agronomic research on cotton, peanuts, corn, sorghum and Bermuda grass. The exhibit area includes indoor and outdoor facilities. In these facilities, visitors can observe educational, entertaining seminars and demonstrations presented by the vendors. Representatives of various companies are always available to answer questions about the equipment, supplies or chemicals they sell.

The 2022 Sunbelt Ag Expo will be on October 18-20.  This year’s theme is “The New Era of Agriculture.”

View the 2022 Georgia Peanut Tour Photo Album

On Georgia Peanut Tour 2022, attendees visited the Georgia Department of Ag Seed Lab. Here, techs tests all types of peanuts from December to the first of May. Over 12,500 peanut samples are tested in that time period annually. Their team work vigorously each year to finish that amount of peanut samples in that short of an amount of time.

At the Ag Seed Lab, located in Tifton, Georgia, three different types of peanut seed samples are obtained, official, service, and certified. The official samples are pulled by the state inspectors whom work for the Department of Agriculture. The service samples are given by farmers or gardener needing testing on their seed (a service provided by the Ag Seed Lab at no charge to the farmer and gardeners). The certified samples are in conjunction with Georgia Crop Improvement Association, who manage the certification program for all crop kinds. Each sample type is performed in order to insure a top quality product in the market place for the consumers in the agriculture industry for the state of Georgia.