Patrick TrautfieldAvocado fruits were likely damaged more than any other crop growing on campus as the result of cold weather throughout January, Cal Poly orchard production manager Mark Welch said last Friday.
Welch estimated that roughly 90 percent of the avocados and 10 to 25 percent of the citrus fruits on campus were damaged because of temperatures that dipped into the 20s in mid-January, contributing to an estimated $26 million worth of damages countywide. He added, however, that the exact figures will not be known until insurance adjustors from Fresno visit Cal Poly sometime this week.
“I’m hedging that prices will be going up for our returns for the fees,” said Welch, who manages about 60 acres of crops on campus.
Low temperatures in San Luis Obispo for days from Jan. 11 to 24 were no higher than 37 degrees, according to Weather.com. Three of those days had lows in the 20s, including a low of 22 degrees Jan. 14.
“We didn’t have cold weather like over the hill in Paso Robles,” Welch said. “At least we would heat back up. For Cal Poly, it was really cold. I think what helped us is we had orchard heaters placed throughout the citrus and avocado.”
The orchard heaters primarily helped citrus fruits other than the 15-plus acres of lemons.
“The 10-to-25 percent estimated damage is for lemons,” he said. “It seems like all the other fruit we have is fine. The lemons do not have orchard heaters.”
Welch said Cal Poly was not hit as hard across the board as agriculture in surrounding areas.
“We’re actually in better shape than Cayucos and Morro Bay,” he said. “We were very well protected, but it was cold. The frost-protection technique is to water the ground thoroughly before it freezes.”
Horticulture and crop sciences faculty member Keith Patterson, who manages the school’s crops of grapes, said that watering was a technique that came in handy. Patterson said Friday it does not appear the 12 student-run acres of grapes on campus suffered any significant damage.
“A lot of it depends on the health of the plant before the cold weather,” Patterson said. “Plants that have been well-watered have a better chance.”
Patterson said the temperatures over the past three weeks were out of the ordinary for January.
“It’s been so long since we’ve seen anything this cold,” he said.
Welch said that Cal Poly’s citrus fruits are targeted to harvest in September.
“They can self-heal,” he said. “We’re not as bad as the (San Joaquin) valley, that’s for sure. I really won’t be 100 percent sure until March or April.”
Insurance adjustors have dealt with more than 2,800 claims in the Fresno area since the cold temperatures arrived, Welch said.
“It’s a grading process,” Welch said of the insurance adjustment. “They’ll give us an average. You get Nos. 1, 2, 3 and 4 and you get a certain price for a No. 1. That’s for the citrus. For the avocados, they have different numbers, but it’s the same concept.”
Launnie Ginn, a crops technician at Cal Poly, agreed with Welch that the avocados suffered the most significant damage. He said they were harder to protect than citrus fruits because of their composition.
“Definitely the avocados are the most sensitive,” Ginn said. “Their structure – they’re a tropical crop. I think it’s just basically the structure, the cells.”
Ginn said the fiscal impact of the cold weather could be considerable.
“It’ll have a lot of impact on avocado and citrus,” he said. “Right now I think everybody is trying to sell what they have. Once that’s gone, it’ll go up. As far as here at Poly, it’s going to hurt our revenues.”
San Luis Obispo County as a whole anticipates losing 60 percent of its avocado crops, according to a memo county agricultural commissioner Robert F. Lilley sent to Governor’s Office of Emergency Services director Henry R. Renteria dated Jan. 22.
The memo also states that the county’s citrus crops are estimated to suffer a 50 percent loss, strawberries a 15 percent annual reduction in production and vegetable crops reductions from 5 to 10 percent.
“Once every 10 years we get a frost like this,” Ginn said. “It’s the most damage I’ve ever seen.”