CALIFORNIA ALBUM : Sneezes Herald Spring in Fresno : The season brings beauty and bounty--and enough pollen to make allergy sufferers weep.

Each March, the people of Fresno rejoice as the sun melts the dreary fog of winter and sets their flat, drab city aglow with pink and white blossoms.

Then they remember spring’s true meaning here--allergies--and reach glumly for the nasal spray.

With its bounty of food crops, suburban lawns and shade trees, California is an allergy war zone aswirl with pollens that can debilitate the vulnerable. Fresno, it seems, is ground zero; few escape the misery.

“When I see the lawn mowers come out, I run for cover,” teacher’s aide Michele Gonzales, 31, said between loud sniffles one recent afternoon. “Spring is beautiful here, but let me tell you, it’s terrible, too.”

Indeed. While other cities are buzzing about college basketball and presidential primaries, Fresno’s March obsessions are antihistamines that don’t make you drowsy and lotion-laced Kleenex that are kind to your nose. The local media carry daily reports on the airborne “pollen counts,” and pharmacist Nancy Asai says the swarms of allergy sufferers are so thick she can’t keep the major remedies in stock.

Fresno even has a “sneezeless garden”--a demonstration plot that shows residents how they can landscape with non-allergenic plants.

“If you live here, you suffer,” declared Stanley Norsworthy, a Fresno State geography professor whose allergies got so bad he could no longer cut his grass. “It plays out in all sorts of ways, like absenteeism, declining performance, and especially irritability--you know, that kick-the-dog sort of behavior.”

The Ziering Allergy Clinic is a sort of command post for Fresno’s annual duel with the downside of spring. Housed in a nondescript building in the shadow of a shopping mall, the clinic is treating close to 900 patients a week. This year, late rains encouraged an explosion of greenery that has pushed pollen counts toward record highs. Business at the clinic is up 30%.

The waiting room is a portrait of springtime misery. Patients slump listlessly in overstuffed armchairs, dabbing at red, drippy noses and gasping through hacking coughs. The younger ones, their stamina less diminished, play video games and roll toy trucks back and forth across the floor. But even they appear ill-humored.

Sally England, a high school art teacher, is in for her weekly injections--the method by which many victims try to build resistance to their personal-enemy pollens. In England’s case, the chief culprit is the olive tree--a silvery specimen that seems ubiquitous in this booming former farm town.

“I’ve got no energy, I’ve got a terrible cough, and I can’t breathe,” England lamented, just before the needle stabbed her left shoulder, then her right. “I’ve missed 13 days of work and I’m depressed. . . . I’ve got to get out of this valley.”

Up next is 7-year-old Nicole James, who sets her jaw, fights back a tear and bares a thin arm. She survives and wins praise plus a reward--an “I Got Shot” sticker.

Down the hall, 12-year-old Josh Feemster fiddles with his San Francisco Giants cap and explains why spring in Fresno is such a downer for him. He plays baseball, and because of his multiple allergies he gets bothered by the infield dust.

“It’s also bad when I play tag, because I’m always out of breath so I can never catch the other guy,” Josh says in a sad, wheezy voice, his eyes bloodshot.

Presiding over the clinic is Dr. William Ziering, who might be described as Fresno’s one-man-anti-allergy band. A slight, bespectacled man, Ziering has spent 22 years comforting the city’s allergy-afflicted with a bedside manner that is serious but softened by his footwear--jogging shoes. Like an accountant during tax season, Ziering operates at top speed this time of year.

Fresno, the doctor explains, is cursed by its poor air circulation, smog and location smack in the middle of California’s farm belt. The city’s spreading housing tracts compound the problem, because each new homeowner plants a pollen-producing lawn and leafy trees for shade from the blistering San Joaquin Valley sun. Once March hits and the mulberry pollens start to drift, those with allergies are doomed.

“Our pollen count rises 15% a year, and it’s only going to get worse,” Ziering said. “Everyone here wants more greenery, but we pay a price for it.”

Perhaps the answer is to mimic Tucson, where mulberry trees are banned and homeowners face $300 fines if they let their Bermuda grass grow too high. Ziering is intrigued by the concept, but not hopeful: “It’s like trying to stamp out smog. Perhaps you can slow the march of the problem, but making monumental changes? Very difficult.”

And so Fresno will continue to sniffle its way through its annual season of discontent--and many victims will continue to mull plans to relocate. Gonzales, for instance, is eyeing a place in the mountains, but figures true relief may only lie to the west:

“I’m starting to think that I ought to live on a boat in the middle of the ocean,” she said. “I know one thing--I can’t last too much longer in this town.”