Florida blueberry harvest delayed after February deep freeze: 'You just recover and continue on'

Farmers explain blueberry industry challenges

Florida blueberry farmers are just beginning their harvest season which was delayed because of the deep freeze in February. FOX 13's Carla Bayron reports.

WINTER HAVEN, Fla. - Florida blueberry farmers are just beginning their harvest season which was delayed because of the deep freeze in February.

The backstory:

David Weber has been in the blueberry business for 38 years.

Weber has owned his 25-acre farm "The Doc Applications" and his Florida Blueberry Nursery near Winter Haven since 2002. 

"We try to make the produce the best blueberries we can possibly produce that produce as much fruit as possible so we can make a profit," Weber said. 

Dig deeper:

Like many farmers across the state, Weber lost crops during the February freeze.

Courtesy: David Weber

Weber had plants falling over from the weight of the ice.

By the numbers:

"Normally we do about 230,000 pounds on these 25 acres, and this year I'm going to guess we'll do about 150,000 pounds," Weber said.

Though thankfully, he was able to save about 90% of his blueberry variety that had been on the market for a long time — compared to the newer blueberries that had only been on the market for the last few years — which he had to scrap entirely. 

Weber will likely start picking fruit during the first and second weeks of April until May.

Big picture view:

Weber says the key is resilience.

"There's always something nature's going to throw at you," Weber said. "It's not unexpected or unusual we have something like, you just recover and continue on and keep on growing them. You just have to have the fortitude to continue after something like this." 

What's next:

Weber expects prices at the store won't go down for another few weeks or so unless the supply from Mexico floods the market.