End of Cold Spells Relief for County Ranchers

After four bitterly cold nights in several areas of Ventura County, weary ranchers who stayed awake baby-sitting their crops were expected to finally get some sleep Thursday night.

Countywide, only Ojai was supposed to dip below freezing Thursday night or early Christmas morning, forecasters said. Temperatures in that city were expected to drop to 25 degrees for a few hours this morning, while in Thousand Oaks the mercury was supposed to hit 32 degrees.

“So every farmer should be able to rest,” Agricultural Commissioner Earl McPhail said Thursday.

“It’s slowly getting warmer,” added Ojai rancher Tony Thacher. “[Wednesday] night I was only up till about 1 a.m., so I know things are improving.”

The warming trend is expected to continue throughout the weekend, with highs reaching the middle 70s by Sunday and lows in the upper 30s.

As the cold snap comes to an end, ranchers are also breathing a sigh of relief, agriculture experts said. While many endured limited damage to crops, it is nothing compared with the devastation felt in the San Joaquin Valley, where icy temperatures destroyed the area’s entire lemon crop.

The San Joaquin Valley provides 15% of California’s lemons. Agriculture officials estimate that California’s citrus industry has lost more than $590 million so far.

“I think most of our ranchers are feeling two things right now,” said Rex Laird, executive director of the Ventura County Farm Bureau. “Tired and thankful. We had some damage, but things could have been a lot worse.”

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In fact, the loss of crops in the San Joaquin area could mean a boost for local lemon farmers, who produce 65% of the state’s lemons and will be expected to fill the market’s citrus needs. And with lemons in such short supply, the price of the fruit could soar.

“This is strictly a supply-and-demand business,” McPhail said. “And when supply is down, the demand goes up, so the market has got to go up.”

Still, experts suggest it is much too early to know how much of a benefit San Joaquin’s loss could be to local growers. There is still a lot of winter left, with plenty of potential for additional freezes, experts said.

And the world market also plays a factor. For example, a country could declare an embargo against U.S. imports and hurt profits for local growers.

“No lemon growers are running out there tripling their Christmas shopping just yet,” Laird said. “It’s still a giant roll of the dice.”

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The price of fresh oranges is also expected to rise. The county’s ranchers say it is too soon to tell how badly their orange crops have been damaged. Last year, local growers made nearly $70 million from the sale of Valencia oranges.

By Monday, ranchers will begin slicing open oranges in search of crystallization and dehydration--telltale signs of frost damage.

Ventura County growers expect, however, that the damage may have been limited to the skin of some fruit, reducing the market value of the crop by about 10% to 15%. The fruit is still salable for use in making juice, but it’s not nearly as profitable.

“Fresh fruit prices, that’s where the money is,” McPhail said. “Juice prices sometimes barely cover picking and hauling costs.”

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Agriculture officials say that while temperatures have been low in the county--dipping to 26 degrees early Thursday in Ojai, six degrees below the freezing mark--the mercury hasn’t stayed down long enough to cause serious harm. Typically, temperatures hovered in the mid- to low 20s for only a couple of hours before creeping back to the low 30s. That has been the ranchers’ saving grace.