During the 2015 Georgia Peanut Tour last week, participants got to visit and learn about several different aspects of the peanut industry. One of the tour stops was at Rolling Hills Farm in Colquitt, Georgia, where Vic Fleet is doing a little something different with his peanut crop.
Fleet has around 1000 acres of irrigated peanuts, and he uses 12 of those acres for his “ready-to-boil green peanut” business. He grows, harvests and sells green peanuts that are ready for boiling to local grocery stores, farm stands and individuals.
When speaking of his business Fleet said, “if it was easy, everybody would be doing it,” and marketing his green peanuts is one of his biggest challenges.
The green peanuts from Rolling Hills Farm are machine picked and cleaned and Vic uses Georgia-11J peanuts, a Virginia variety. He said he likes the 11-J variety because they have good resistance for tomato spotted wilt virus, they are a larger nut and the shell can be opened easily after boiling.
Fleet explaining peanut cleaning equipment
Participants of the Georgia Peanut Tour got to see some of Vic’s peanut cleaning equipment and everyone enjoyed getting to try some of his fresh green boiled peanuts.