Tropical Storm Iselle devastates papaya trees but Maui onions were spared

The Grower reported this week that TS Iselle destroyed a significant part of the papaya crop for this year, killing over 20 percent of all Hawaiian papaya trees.  High winds and torrential rain also caused widespread power outages and flooding.  However, because of advance notice of the storm’s movement, Maui onion growers were able to get into their fields before the storm hit and harvest the last onions ( a sweet variety similar to Georgia’s Vidalia onions) from this year’s crop just in time.  You can read the story by clicking here.  In the past, tropical storms and hurricanes have severely damaged crops in the Southeast, most notably lime orchards destroyed by Hurricane Andrew in 1992, which forced producers to move most lime production to Mexico in the following years.