FRESH FLOWERS : Cold Cuts : Because of the moderate climate, local growers fill a lucrative void by stepping in where others are left waiting for spring.

Tending colorful blooms that are grown outdoors for the fresh-cut flower industry is a year-round endeavor for local growers--even during the winter months when many of the country’s other producers are left waiting till spring to sow their fields.

Because of the moderate climate here, local growers are able to fill a lucrative void in the cut-flower business. Their counterparts elsewhere, knocked out of the market for at least a couple months each year, are left to plan for warmer days.

“That’s our advantage over the rest of the country,” said Fred Van Wingerden, owner of Pyramid Flowers in Oxnard. “In many other parts of the country there is just no way to grow in the wintertime.”

Bloom-withering frost is the main culprit for lost production. “We’re fortunate in Ventura County because we get a minimal amount of frost,” Van Wingerden said. And what frost there is can generally be met with overhead sprinklers or wind machines--devices rendered useless in consistent subfreezing temperatures.

Although the variety of flowers grown in open fields are many, there are three that generally top the winter list, local growers said. These are stock, statice and gypsophila--better known as Baby’s Breath.

Stock is the hardiest of the lot and prefers the winter’s coolness, Van Wingerden said. Valued for its spicy-sweet fragrance, stock features narrow gray-green leaves and stems with numerous clusters of flowers. “These come in five or six different colors in the field, such as white, pink, purple and lavender,” he said.

Much of what is planted during winter is slated for Valentine’s Day, and even more of it for Easter and Mother’s Day.

“To have flowers out by then, you had to have planted during the winter,” said Steve Fukumoto, a manager with West Flower Growers in Oxnard. “So except for those grown in greenhouses--like roses and carnations--most of the others are grown outdoors.”

Fukumoto said many area growers have found a niche by growing novelty-type flowers such as statice, which produces small, delicate, paper-like blooms. Rose growers plan for one day a year, Valentine’s Day, he said. “But statice is consistent the whole year.”

“That is the real key to California production,” Van Wingerden said. “We can have a year-round relationship with our customers. If you sell to a customer only nine months out of the year, they have to go find someone else. It can be hard to get those customers back.”

The winter market also commands premium prices. Take gypsophila. The slender-stemmed, tumbleweed-like plant--profuse with tiny white or pink flowers--annually floods the summertime market. Wholesale prices plummet.

So local growers try to squeeze through the window of opportunity that Mother Nature has provided them during cooler times. “People really try to produce gyp for the Valentine’s Day market,” Van Wingerden said. Much of the wintertime gypsophila will be snatched up at premium prices by florists, using the weed as filler for all those Valentine’s Day rose bouquets.

No matter how moderate the climate, though, outdoor production during the winter is tough going and can be a big crapshoot. The deep freeze of 1990 still weighs heavy on the minds of some growers. Many crops were decimated.

“You are always taking a big chance,” Van Wingerden said. “If you get two weeks of rain right before Valentine’s Day, it can set your production back considerably. If that happens, then you hit a post Valentine’s market, which is worth considerably less.”

So how have the recent storms affected local production? “The rains really weren’t harmful,” said Dave Arimura, sales manager for Camarillo Floral Inc., a grower and shipper. It’s the spring or summer rains that can wreak havoc. “The warmer rains are damaging because bacteria is able to thrive,” Arimura said. Rotting is the result. “The cool rains actually act as a refrigerant.”

Van Wingerden said the rains also provided an alternative to expensive irrigation water and aid in washing salts from the soil. “If it’s going to rain, let it rain in January,” he said.