Freeze Hits State Citrus Crop Hard

California farmers, who on Tuesday sustained their worst frost damage in years, were bracing for another round of freezing temperatures that could destroy a significant portion of the lemon and orange crops.

Colder weather is forecast today through Thursday, with temperatures expected to drop into the low 20s in some farming communities. Meteorologists said a jet stream is carrying frigid air into California from Alaska and western Canada.

Farmers fear greater damage in the days ahead, especially to lemons and oranges, which are especially susceptible to freezing.

The cold early Tuesday morning destroyed the entire lemon crop in the San Joaquin Valley, which produces about 15% of the state’s lemons. The loss was estimated at about $90 million. The freeze also damaged strawberry, avocado and other crops elsewhere in the state.

Joel Nelsen, president of California Citrus Mutual, the citrus producers’ trade association, predicted that lemon prices will increase “by the first of the new year, if not sooner.”

California grows 90% of the nation’s lemons and 20% of its oranges.

Damage to the lemon crop is the largest loss suffered by citrus growers since 1990, when freezing temperatures robbed the state’s agriculture industry of nearly $800 million, Nelsen said.

“This is devastating,” he said. “Just when farmers are beginning to recover economically, Mother Nature throws you this kind of Christmas present. It’s not exactly what we had hoped for.”

Bob Krauter, a spokesman for the California Farm Bureau Federation, the state’s largest farm organization, said citrus is especially vulnerable to freezing weather because the fruit is of tropical origin.

“Most years, we have no problem growing them in California,” Krauter said. “But when the arctic blasts move in, there’s very little we can do.”

Krauter said California’s entire lemon crop could be jeopardized if the temperatures stay in the 20s long enough. Lemons freeze at even higher temperatures than oranges because they contain less sugar, which acts like a natural antifreeze.

Officials said the crop destruction could worsen the economy in the Fresno area, where the unemployment rate is already twice the state’s 5.7% average.

“We’re an agriculture-based economy,” said Fresno City Manager Jeffrey Reid, “so everybody hurts. Anything that hurts the farmer hurts the region of Fresno.”

Growers in the Southland were also assessing losses to strawberry, avocado and row crops--such as celery and red bell peppers--but said they didn’t appear to be as significant.

But that could change for farmers throughout the state as the threat of more frigid weather looms.

“We’re living on the edge of disaster,” said Richard Johansen, who grows mostly citrus on 80 acres in Orland, 100 miles north of Sacramento.

Johansen was luckier than some. He harvested his acres of Meyer lemons last week and suffered only moderate damage to his navel and blood-orange crop.

“It’s going to take a full seven days before all the damage shows up, so we’re crossing our fingers,” he said.

Some farmers will need the extra luck, forecasters say. A freeze warning was issued Tuesday night for Ventura County, which produces 60% of the state’s lemons and a fifth of its entire citrus crop.

Some growers planned to use wind machines to keep air circulating, pump in ground water to warm fields and hire helicopters to push down warm pockets of air. But the weather service and others said those tactics could be ineffective because the cold air is expected to drop down closer to ground level.

The cold-weather pattern caused most farmers and work crews to go on “frost patrol” Monday night and early Tuesday.

Will Harrison, who owns Southern California Agricultural Group, a crop consulting firm in Irvine, said some strawberry farmers stayed up all night to monitor temperatures in their fields. Others kept their wind machines and irrigation systems running.

The tactic worked for many farmers, who said their crops suffered minimal damage.

Cecil Martinez, who grows strawberries on 88 acres near the ocean in Oxnard, relied on a hookup that transmitted air and soil temperatures in his fields to a home computer 7 miles away.

The temperatures dipped below freezing several times during the night but didn’t persist, so Martinez stayed in bed. When he inspected the fields Tuesday morning, “the fruits were in good shape,” though the frost had destroyed the blossoms on about 5% of his strawberry plants, he said.

A.G. Kawamura, who grows strawberries in Irvine, picked damaged blooms off his plants Tuesday. “I’m just praying for warmer weather,” he said.