- [David] "A Fork in the Road" was brought to you by... - I'm Tyler Harper.

As your agriculture commissioner, I have the honor of representing one of the hardest-working groups of people in our state, our farmers.

That's why we invite you to take the Georgia Grown Challenge.

Try any Georgia specialty crop against any other state's produce, and you'll pick Georgia Grown.

♪ Picture perfect ♪ ♪ Hang the picture on the wall ♪ ♪ Hm ♪ ♪ I see the shine from afar ♪ ♪ Yet to me, you are the star ♪ ♪ All right, baby, hey ♪ ♪ Feels good, feels fine ♪ ♪ Get the feeling, pass it on ♪ ♪ Just pass it on ♪ ♪ Na-na, na-na, na-na ♪ - I'm Tyler Harper.

As your agriculture commissioner, I have the honor of representing one of the hardest-working groups of people in our state, our farmers.

That's why we invite you to take the Georgia Grown Challenge.

Try any Georgia specialty crop against any other state's produce, and you'll pick Georgia Grown.

- The fascinating and ever-changing world of agriculture.

Let's hit the road here in Georgia and meet the farmers, producers, makers, and bakers who keep us all fed and keep ups coming back for more, straight ahead at the "Fork in the Road."

♪ Mm ♪ ♪ Mm ♪ ♪ I came from the mud ♪ ♪ There's dirt on my hands ♪ ♪ Strong like a tree ♪ ♪ There's roots where I stand ♪ - [David] Georgia farmers, artisans, merchants, and producers, we depend on these men and women every day of our lives through the choices we make and the food we consume.

Their strategy and approach is always shifting, but the end game remains the same: results.

(gentle music) The Citrus State.

Yes, the Peach State may have another sweet and juicy crop making itself known in this rich Southern soil.

Now, Georgia peaches are still as sweet as ever, but did you know that these Georgia-grown mandarins are as well?

Satsumas, grapefruits, lemons, limes, the list goes on and on.

And several Georgia farmers are jumping on board to deliver these tasty citrus options all over the South and beyond.

♪ Mm ♪ Let's begin our journey in Ochlocknee and meet a lady who, along with her husband, has helped show the world the endless possibilities when it comes to Georgia-grown citrus.

(lighthearted music) This gorgeous citrus grove is the home of JoNina Farm, and this is the flourishing nursery known as Georgia Grown Citrus.

Retired federal law enforcement officer Lindy Savelle and her husband, Perry, run both the grove and the nursery, making a decision to do so back in 2015 even though the practice of growing citrus in Georgia was not such a common thing at that time.

- Jo was my husband's father's name, and Nina was his mom, so JoNina, and they bought this farm in 1935.

We decided to keep the name JoNina when we moved back here.

I spent spanning over 34 years of federal law enforcement, and when I retire, we knew we were gonna come back to these two small farms that we have.

We have this one here in Thomas County and one in Mitchell County, and we just felt like this was the thing to do, to come back where we grew up.

I felt compelled to do something to contribute to my community when I came back.

We started doing research long before I retired, I was actually working overseas.

Finally, we went down the list, and citrus might be that thing that we can do on our farm because it can be a small farm crop.

And since 2015, we've expanded from growing the fruit to now growing the trees, so we have this kind of a corny thing we say, root to fruit.

You know, we grow the tree and fruit, everybody understands that, it's the fruit, so we do both.

We sell the trees, we ship 'em online, and we sell 'em in person as well.

This is how we package 'em, and we put a stake in here that hits the top of the box so it keeps the tree from sliding up and down in the box.

- [David] Does it go refrigerated, or does it?

- No.

- Oh, it can hold up.

- So just like this.

- [David] That's very neat, and they can just plant it, be it Maine or South Georgia.

- Let's see where this one's going.

This one's going to Oregon.

We sell the fruit to buyers, and we're trying to shift more towards agritourism so that every piece of fruit is consumed here on our farm.

We have juice, and we have jellies and jams and feed leftovers to the cattle, so we're trying to use every little piece of citrus fruit.

(bright music) - [David] And it's not just one or two types of citrus sprouting their roots in here, there are dozens upon dozens of fruit I'd never seen before.

- These are finger limes, so we have red finger lime and regular finger lime, and then we have giant finger lime.

And a finger lime is also called citrus caviar because, you know, vesicles in citrus are normally teardrop-shaped, and these are round, so when you cut it open, it oodles out these little round vesicles of citrus, it looks like caviar.

This is called a yuzu lemon.

I had a gentleman call me yesterday from Pennsylvania, he grows this outside in the ground in Pennsylvania.

They say it'll go to 10 degrees, it's a Japanese lemon that's primarily used for culinary purposes.

You know, normally when you use lemon for cooking, you put it on after the fact because that's when you want it to taste real lemony, but a yuzu, you put the lemon on before you cook, and it maintains the lemon flavor through the heat process.

These are Meiwa kumquats.

Same thing, here's some baby kumquats on this tree.

This is a limequat tree.

- [David] A limequat?

- Limequat, it's a cross between a lime and a kumquat, so it's a hearty lime.

And I've had 'em, they're quite tasty.

You can make key lime pies out of it and everything.

A lotta people like it because it's a lot heartier than a lime.

You got a lotta grapefruits, limes, lemons, Hamlins, satsumas, tangerines, oranges.

You know, lime doesn't have to be just green.

We sell a rangpur lime that is orange on the inside.

We sell a red lime that's red on the inside.

I learned this because people call and say, "Hey, do you have this or do you have that?"

And I go, "No, but I can get the budwood, and we can have a tree for you in about two years."

(relaxing music) - [David] And part of Lindy and Perry's mission is to expand the number of growers in the state and expand the consumer's overall knowledge of what can be grown here in this rich Southern Georgia soil.

- Most of the citrus will bloom in the spring, and then it'll come off in the fall, so you've got a long waiting period there to make sure that that fruit stays on the tree and it's taken care of.

We tell everyone, in the spring, you're gonna have blooms that fall off, one half of 1% of the blooms turn into fruit, so you're gonna have a lot of blooms falling on the ground.

If you don't have any fruit, I tell people, "Call me, 'cause you got something wrong going on.

If we don't know the answer for you, we'll contact our consultant, who can help you figure out what's going on with your tree."

These are tree defenders, and there are many styles.

You see this little micro-jet?

You put this micro-jet on your tree in your yard and turn it on at 36.

What's gonna happen is frost is gonna cover this, harden it off.

You got yourself a igloo.

That tree is not gonna freeze under there.

(bright music) - [David] What differentiates a kumquat from a tangerine or a satsuma or a clementine?

- You know, just like us, we have heritage and lineage in our background, and so do these.

They're hybrids, most citrus is already a hybrid.

Like a Meyer lemon, just to give you an example.

A Meyer lemon is a cross between an orange and a lemon.

That's why a Meyer lemon is more cold-hardy than a regular lemon.

We do plan to expand to agritourism and bring our family in and make this a place where people can come.

You'd be surprised how many people just wanna come to a farm.

They wanna bring their dog and run around and walk over the pond dam or walk out on the pier.

In the fall, we have an event called a Clip and Sip.

We let you get on a wagon, and you ride up to the grove and clip away.

We don't charge you for what you eat in the field, only what you put in your bag.

The sipping part is we try different types of fruit and let you taste the juice.

Any time you add citrus to your diet, the health benefits of it are pretty obvious when you think about it's something natural coming into your body instead of something that's been prepared.

You know, kids, instead of eating Oreos, they need to be eating oranges.

(bright music) What we're seeing in citrus in this state is you've got large growers, you know, people that have packing sheds, and they grow vegetables and things like that.

They're putting in a lot of acres.

But what you're also seeing is small, little family farms that have 5, 10, 15, 20 acres that they wanna grow something.

Citrus, you don't have to have a million-dollar picker to pick it.

You've got the capital input of putting in the trees, but then until the trees get bigger, you don't even have to have a sprayer, you can do it with a hand sprayer, that's what we did for two years.

You know, people were skeptical of the citrus industry here in Georgia, and I think this year, citrus kinda proved itself as a staying commodity in Georgia.

- [David] So Lindy has shown that this is one type of farming that a small family can do together and at the same time do it well.

And as knowledge of these fragrant fruits grow, so do the gorgeous orchards of South Georgia.

♪ Mm ♪ We now journey all around South Georgia en route to Tifton, where a few legendary peach growers have merged into the world of citrus.

(lighthearted music) Will McGehee is a farmer, a marketer, and a great storyteller.

Back in season two, he brought me to the side of the old hotel that housed the summer workers for Pearson Farm's peach-picking operations.

- [Will] Word out of everybody's mouth is, "Oh, you from Georgia?"

And it's kind of a neat thing, it's kind of our signature fruit for the state, and we're just honored to be a part of that legacy.

We have a special climate here in Georgia, where there's a lotta peaches grown in other places, but peaches from Georgia are special for several different reasons.

We grow in this amazing red clay here in Middle Georgia, where our orchards are, and the clay gives the peaches so much goodness and nutrients, and it's a great place to grow trees, first of all.

(lighthearted music) - [David] Peaches do grow well here in Georgia, and this family will continue that proud tradition during good times and bad.

But over the years, they've smartly learned to diversify, and with the help of a few Southern universities and other researchers, they've started another operation that's bringing tasty sweet mandarins to your local groceries and farmers' markets.

Let's begin our mandarin journey with Will down at a partner farm in Nashville, Georgia known as Double Branch Farms.

(bright music) - We're at the Boyd Family Farm, Double Branch Farms here in Nashville, Georgia, and we've got an amazing array of citrus out here.

This particular variety is a satsuma mandarin.

The reason this is such a significant variety is that it is cold-hardy, meaning that we can actually grow it in a little cooler climate than where people normally think citrus is grown.

Years ago, the University of Florida, University of Georgia kinda helped the industry out with some cold-hardy varieties of satsuma mandarins that grew, and this tree is absolutely loaded.

And when you pick this, what makes them so wonderful is that they are easy peel.

And so when you put your finger in it, as you see, the peel just comes off so easy.

And within about four or five seconds, you have got a perfect piece of fruit.

Also, when you look at how uniform the segments are, you can see how much juice is just absolutely oozing outta the fruit.

Rarely do you get to be involved in something that is a brand-new industry in any state.

Most things have been grown and have been propagated for generations, but in Georgia, we got something pretty cool that's going on right now, and that's a burgeoning citrus business, and it's really led by these satsuma mandarin.

You see how many pounds are just on this tree, I mean, it's absolutely gorgeous.

You notice how the branches bend, so this is not a hard wood, this is soft wood, and it allows the tree to weep under that pressure, but it doesn't snap.

And, I mean, this tree is beautiful, it's loaded.

This is the perfect kinda size fruit.

What we try to do is bring different sizes to the market off of this tree, so we'll have some small sizes that go into bags, we'll have some of these medium sizes that go into the school program, and then we'll have some larger sizes on here that go out to the farmers' market.

Just really excited to be a part of this and show the world what we got, I mean, it doesn't get any prettier than that right there, look at that.

You typically get to test out several different varieties.

Who knew how many different varieties of mandarins there were?

There's miyagawas and Owaris and brown selects and Silverhills and all these different varieties, but you don't really know what you're gonna like to grow until you stick it in the ground, wake up the next morning, and you do that year after year, and you figure out what's right for your dirt and your climate in this part of Georgia.

And the way the field is laid out, you've got some satsumas planted here, and as the field rolls that way, we're gonna get into a bunch of different other kinds of citrus.

Another variety of citrus that's being grown is a shiranui, or dekopon.

They've got this little knob on top right here, you can see this knob right here, that's kinda the signature of the shiranui.

And when you peel it, you'll take your finger in it like that, and you'll peel that back, and off it comes.

And the fruit is almost meaty.

It's got a lotta body to it and texture, and it is high-acid and high-sugar all at the same time.

It's almost like a SweeTart, when you eat a SweeTart.

The reason we love growing these is they come off after satsumas, so you get to go through satsuma season, you get to pick your satsuma trees, and then when you get to this particular variety, the guys in the field have something to do, we're picking those, we're bringing 'em up to the packing house, and it's a later season thing that we can use the guys in the groves and the packing house to pack, that Georgia has the shiranuis as well.

The Ruby Reds, the hidden gems grown right here in the heart of Georgia.

What's neat about the grapefruit grown here is it doesn't have that bite.

It's sweet, it's tart, and it's a little bit more mellow.

Each one's a little different, so next variety we got Mr. Boyd planted is we've got Cara cara navels.

They look absolutely gorgeous.

You can see the color is just absolutely electric on these, and- - [David] And they're not even ready yet.

- They are not even ready yet.

You end up testing the piece of fruit for two pieces of measurables.

You got a Brix reading, which is how much sugar's in it, and then you've got a acid reading, which is how bitter they are, the acid, and you're waiting on those to come into balance.

When your ratio gets perfect, you send the boys in there and knock it out.

Now, what is beautiful about this fruit is you think everybody says, "Orange, orange, orange," but look at that.

- [David] Oh my gosh.

- [Will] That is a true Cara cara.

Absolutely gorgeous.

- [David] Almost like a blood orange.

- Yep, sweet.

(bright music) We're actually gon' be able to see a little harvesting right now in the kishus.

Kishus are the most delicious mandarins.

They're a toy mandarin, extremely tiny, small segments, but is easy to peel as anything you'll come across.

Watch this.

Look at it, it just presents itself like a flower.

- [David] It's adorable.

- Isn't that adorable?

(David laughs) It is so easy, and, mm, that's awesome.

One of the issues with the kishu, though, is every single one has to be clipped.

See where it hits the branch right here?

If I pulled that off, look what it does.

- Oh, yeah.

- It creates a hole.

So you have to take a set of clippers and clip every single one of these.

I want you to watch what my man right here is doing.

One of the other things that we're trying to get done as an industry is to sell what we call stem and leaf.

So when you walk into a store, you're actually getting the fruit on the limb with the leaves.

This fruit is ripening up at the perfect time where we sit around the table and eat as families, and what do people like to do in the middle of the table is make centerpieces.

And so you can actually make an edible centerpiece out of the fruit that's coming from the fields in Georgia.

- [David] Little smaller, but the trees are bigger.

- They are, the trees are bigger on Sugar Belles.

This variety of citrus is an absolute treat, one of the favorite varieties of folks that send stuff through the mail.

They love Sugar Belle.

It is amazing color right now, and... - [David] Sugar Belle.

- [Will] There's your Sugar Belle right there.

- [David] When you have 'em back to back, you can really notice the difference between them.

- [Will] Mm-hmm.

That's gon' be the sweetest piece of fruit you've put in your mouth.

I mean, that is just awesome fruit.

- [David] Are these all seedless, everything we've gotten into?

- [Will] Everything we've gotten through here is all seedless, correct.

- [David] Could we have been doing this 30 years ago in Georgia, or did we need that research first to really be able to take a risk?

- I mean, satsumas were grown on the southern slopes of Japan for centuries, so the plant material was there.

We just had not had the mandarin research that says you can grow them here.

- Satsumas too were grown in the 1900s, early 1900s in Georgia and North Florida.

- [David] Right.

- And a freeze came through and pretty much knocked 'em out.

So they didn't have the root stock back then to get 'em to a cold-hardy stage, and so satsumas have been around a long time, like Will said, from Japan to here, and now there's research that have came down the pipeline of making 'em more cold-hardy, so could we have grown 30 years ago was the original question?

Not on the scale we're growing 'em now.

- [David] First year, you're not gonna be producing.

- You're looking at three, four years out before you get a real good marketable fruit.

Berrien County used to be the tobacco market for the state of Georgia and North Florida, and as tobacco kinda went out, we were looking for alternative crops to come back in to replace that tobacco, and that's why I looked at citrus trees and citrus, because it fit well in small fields that are not suitable for row crops.

And it's worked out well so far, and I think it will continue to.

- [David] We now follow Will and the citrus back to Tifton, home of The Satsuma Company.

- What we got here is a bin dumper that's taking right around 450 to 500 pounds of fruit, and the fruit's gon' come out on this surge belt right here.

Basically, we're trying to get it nice and smooth and scattered across this belt and get it into our washer.

This is kind of our first line of defense.

Fruit comes out of the field, everything with this fruit has been clipped just right there, all done by hand with clippers.

So we're gonna put this on here, and we're gonna go through a washer and just get it ready for the market.

This is our first inspection table.

We're basically looking for anything that we know that the fruit is not good on the inside.

You can see that this is dry.

There's just no juice underneath it, so this is our first line of defense on getting anything out that we don't wanna go through the process.

What I do wanna show people is you see how beautiful this piece of fruit is, but it's got a little cheek of green.

You might think that it's not ripe at this time, but I wanna show you something amazing.

Underneath that skin is very vibrant, orange segments.

And so it does not have to be perfectly orange to be perfect, so.

(lighthearted music) As good of a piece of fruit as I've had today right there.

We've got fruit coming out at three distinct sizes.

Each one of these sizes has a home.

The one in the middle, we will deem as the right size serving size for our school lunch program.

So what we need is a machine to select these out of the go.

These are a little bit small, too small of a serving size for schools, these will go into our bag program, two-pound pouch bag, which'll go out to retail.

And then finally, you've got a little bit larger fruit here, a great eating piece of fruit.

It's just a little oversized for a bag or for the school.

So we've got three great homes for all three sizes.

I just need to show you how we get 'em sized.

(upbeat music) So in order to read this piece of fruit, I'm taking two measurements from it.

I've got a diameter, and I've got an amount of grams, how much it weighs.

And in order to do that, I've gotta get each piece of fruit in one of these cups right here.

So the fruit goes across these singulators, which gets a nice, single-file line.

They go into a cup right here, and underneath the cup, they go into this sizer.

I've got eight lanes of fruit coming right here.

Underneath this lane, bright light, taking the weight, and getting the diameter size so I know exactly who gets what when.

This sorting technology has made packing and getting citrus to the market a lot easier than doing everything by hand.

So the fruit has been cleaned in the back, we've dried it down, and now we're putting it through an applicator that basically coats the fruit in a food-grade wax that preserves the juice inside the satsuma.

And then we've got a giant two banks of driers that gets 'em nice and dry and ready to go into the package.

So this fruit we call jumbo fruit.

Typically, this is the fruit that's on the end of the limb, and it blows up past the point of being really marketable.

It's got a lotta this pith in it.

There is a certain amount of juice in it.

We'll end up sending this to the juicer and making nice, fresh satsuma juice out of it.

So these are the little bitties.

These are the ones that we get inside the bags.

And we'll put these inside pouches, and we'll get them into your local retailers.

As the belt gets across this, it kicks the fruit off and rolls down into this box.

We fill this box all the way up to the top.

You see she's putting the fruit in there.

And when it stops giving her fruit, we know that that's a full box of satsumas ready to go to the schoolkids.

There we go, we stack 'em on a pallet.

We got nine on a layer.

We'll take this pallet up six high and send 54 of these to Royal Foods up in Atlanta.

Royal's gonna warehouse them and then redeliver 'em out to the school systems for us, and these'll be on lunchroom tables on Thursday and Friday of this week, it'll happen just like that.

(gentle music) One of the most fulfilling parts of doing this is growing something in Georgia that hadn't been a part of our economy before, and then actually getting to take it into the school systems, and you know that children, pre-K all the way up through seniors, are getting to enjoy the fruits of your labor, and, you know, just all fuzzy, warm and fuzzy feelings about it.

- [David] So we know they're healthy, we know they're tasty, and have learned about how they can grow quite well here in Georgia.

Just like peaches, Will and the team here at The Satsuma Company depend on good weather, hard workers, and like most farmers, a little bit of luck to grow and deliver year after year.

(lighthearted music) So, from the nursery where the knowledge is gained to the farms and the factories, Georgia's citrus industry is as strong as it's ever been, getting the chance to help grow healthy and strong kids right along with it.

I'm David Zelski, see you at the next "Fork in the Road."

"A Fork in the Road" was brought to you by... - I'm Tyler Harper.

As your agriculture commissioner, I have the honor of representing one of the hardest-working groups of people in our state, our farmers.

That's why we invite you to take the Georgia Grown Challenge.

Try any Georgia specialty crop against any other state's produce, and you'll pick Georgia Grown.

- [Announcer] From produce to people, the best things are grown and raised in Georgia.

Even in tough times, we come together, work hard, and grow strong.

When you purchase Georgia Grown products, you support farmers, families, and this proud state we call home.

Together, we will keep Georgia growing.

- I'm Tyler Harper.

As your agricultural commissioner, I have the honor of representing one of the hardest-working groups of people in our state, our farmers.

That's why we invite you to take the Georgia Grown Challenge.

Try any Georgia specialty crop against any other state's produce, and you'll pick Georgia Grown.