CABOT, Ark. — After seeing a stretch of warm weather, it got cold in Arkansas on Monday.
Farmers who may have been expecting an early season have now been preparing their crops for a possible frost.
At Holland Bottom Farm in Cabot, Tim Odom's fields of green are covered in blankets of white. A sudden cold night means he spent the day tucking in his hundreds of thousands of crops to keep them warm tonight.
"It takes about seven men all day long to do it and we'll have to uncover in about three days. As soon as I feel like we can only cover with no freeze," Odom explained.
He said that it has turned out to be an early season because without the summer they could lose the whole crop.
"If it gets down below 32 and it stays there for more than 10 minutes. But with the cover, he said they're only going to lose about 2-3% of the crops," he added.
As he dutifully protects his plants Odom has also been watching out for any severe weather this season, pointing out hail damage from previous storms.
"I've prayed for everybody not to get hail, no strawberry farmers," Odom said.
Even still right now is the relative calm before the storm of visitors, when thousands of people from across the country will come back to the farm to pick Holland Bottom berries.
"The start of the strawberry season can start as late as the 23rd, 24th of April and as early as the 16th," Odom said. "We'll have strawberries for solar eclipse. How's that?"
Odom expects one of the sweetest years yet— or so he hopes.
"I'd say this is probably the best one we've had probably in five or six years as of right now as the bloom has said, so I'm not counting the waves or chickens yet," Odom said.
Holland Bottom Farms is also preparing for special ice cream and eclipse t-shirts.
They expect to open up their season in about two weeks. Their latest updates and contact information can be found here.