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Strawberries
are ripe in Merriwether at Gurosik's Berry Plantation
Edgefielddaily.com
web posted April 16, 2005
Staff reporting
 It’s a “berry” good
day in
the neighborhood, if the neighborhood is Merriwether and you are on Briggs Road
turning
into Gurosik’s Berry Plantation, 345 Briggs Road, North
Augusta SC
(phone 803-278-0594). Edgefield
Daily.com was taken for a tour of the plantation and facilities by
owner Clyde
Gurosik and his wife Marilyn, and a very impressive tour it was.
Mr.
Gurosik, or Clyde as he preferred
to be called, said he has been growing strawberries “all my life,”
relating, “my
first memory was being in a baby carrier in the strawberry fields,” as
his
parents were harvesting in his birthplace of Pennsylvania. Mr. Gurosik said his
father
and grandfather were growers and although he became an engineer and
managed the
building of thermo-nuclear weapons for over 20 years at the Savannah
River Site
with DuPont, and later until retiring during the tenure of
Westinghouse, this
is what he always wanted to do.
The Berry Plantation expands
for 100 acres, though most cannot see the expansive fields from the
market
building and the “U pick” field nearby. Mr. Gurosik stated he looked at
over a
hundred different locations in the area before finding his farm, which
at the
time was forest. “When I saw this place, I knew this is where we needed
to be,”
he said explaining the soil had the perfect blend of sandy loam on top
and a
clay base which he said held the proper nutrients better than most
soils.
“You
can taste it in the
fruit,” he said. An opinion that many locals will agree with.
Starting out with just 12
acres, two of which he planted in strawberries, his farm really took
off when
he retired in 2000. “Right now we have 12 acres of strawberries, two of
those
being the ‘U pick’ field,” he said. In addition Mr. Gurosik said they
have 3
acres of hybrid blackberries, 2 acres of asparagus, and 2 acres each of
tomatoes
(7 varieties), cucumbers, beans, and ¾ of an acre in
flowers.
The strawberry plants are a
hybrid strawberry that must be replaced every season to keep out
diseases. Mr.
Gorosik said he gets his plants from Canada where they are
culture grown,
otherwise known as cloning, and shipped to him in early September. “We
tear everything
out, fumigate, replace the mounds and plastic, and plant in September,”
he
said. “At first, until the roots take hold we pump 1200 gallons of
water per
minute to the plants,” explaining the expansive $60,000 irrigation
system he
installed which can transfer water from any of his many ponds to the
fields or
other ponds using 3 diesel pumps and 7 electric pumps . “We trenched so
that
when we water, the runoff is directed back to one of the ponds out of
the
fields. The only thing we lose in irrigation is the evaporation,” he
said. At
120,000 plants, that is a lot of water used, and saved.
Mr. Gurosik stated the average cost
per acre
for planting the strawberries ran between $12,000 and $14,000 per acre,
excluding the cost of irrigation and labor and harvesting. The
harvesting
begins in late March or early April and the season will run through the
first
part of July.
The plants will contain fruit
sets ranging from 75 to 120 per plant. As the berries ripen they are
harvested
at three day intervals.
Currently Mr. Gurosik said
they have six satellite markets, Wacky Wayne’s at I-20, Baston Road
in Martinez
at the Curtain Call, the farmers
market, and other locations around the CSRA not counting the home
market on Briggs Road
in
Merriwether.
The other produce will begin
to ripen in mid to late May, with the black berries being first, and
will also
run through July. The flowers are available pre-picked or you can pick
your own
for “all you can hold in your hand for $2.00,” Mr. Gurosik said.
In addition Mr. Gurosik said
they had added herbs to this year’s list of goodies they provide.
The strawberries are
ripe,
sweet, and plentiful and Gurosik’s Berry Plantation offers a great
family
outing to enjoy picking your own, or browsing the gift shop and picking
out
pre-picked berries.
What: Gurosik’s Berry Plantation
Where: 345 Briggs Road, North
Augusta SC
(Merriwether) Directions
When: Season runs April
through July 4
Years in business: Started in
1981, 24 years
Owner(s): Clyde
and Marilyn Gurosik
On the web: Gurosik’s Berry
Plantation
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