Cold Snap Worries Ventura County Farmers

Don Reeder hasn’t slept much the last few nights. The manager of 2,500 acres of avocados and citrus in Ventura County says it has been too cold for comfort.

Reeder, president of Somis Pacific Agricultural Management, has been waiting for that late-night call that tells him the freeze is on, and it’s time to fire up the wind machines, get the irrigation dripping and save crops from the ice that could destroy them.

For the first time in a year, that call came Sunday night. It was 28 degrees in Fillmore. Reeder was up at 12:30 a.m., working to warm a Fillmore orange grove.

After a Southern California summer that seemed to stretch through December, the new year has dawned with a sudden icy chill that threatens citrus and avocado crops. And with forecasts for more cold weather, growers are hustling to make sure they are ready for a freeze.

“If it freezes, you don’t have a crop,” Reeder said.

Crops are particularly susceptible to a freeze now, because they have not put on their cold-weather jackets to prepare for winter. The mild weather from the extended summer has confused the trees. Some avocado groves are blooming.

They think it’s still summer, said Rex Laird, executive director of the Ventura County Farm Bureau. Instead of becoming dormant in mid-October, when the soil around them usually cools, the avocado trees continue to grow new branches and roots and to produce new fruit.

“We’re kind of set up for a big fall,” Laird said. “The trees are stressed, and then you get this real hard freeze where it gets down to 26 degrees for seven to eight hours. That’s when you’ll see some major losses. The anxiety level is there because the growers know that,” he said. “And they’re just hoping we get some rain so [the trees] get back a little more vigor before we get hit with something.”