“It’s some of the best looking tobacco around here,” said Taylor Williams, area specialized agent with the North Carolina Cooperative Extension Service. Williams serves Moore, Richmond and Lee counties.
Harvesting is well underway throughout Moore County, and Williams said he has heard no reports of scalding, a condition brought on by intense heat and sunlight. Scalding causes tobacco leaves to turn yellow and pale, which diminishes quality.
Rainy weather in late June and early July caused some blue mold damage in North Carolina, but that damage was minuscule this year, Williams said.
“The blue mold was caught early this year and we got it under control,” he said. “It was costly to a few growers but nothing like we had last summer.”
Moore County has an allotment of 1,676.82 acres and a quota of 3,487,271 pounds this year. Tobacco is being grown on 167 farms, according to statistics compiled by the Moore County Farm Services Agency.
There are no auction warehouses operating in Moore County this year, and more than 80 percent of the growers are selling their quotas under contract directly to cigarette manufacturing companies. The remaining farmers are taking their tobacco to warehouses in Smithfield, Wilson, Kinston, and Fairmont and to Mullins, S.C.
Williams said the hot, dry weather this summer has taken its toll on other crops in this area, including soybeans and corn. These are crops that are rarely irrigated. However, most tobacco growers in Moore County use irrigation for their crops.
North Carolina is a major producer of flue-cured tobacco, favored by cigarette manufacturers because of its flavor, aroma and color.
