VENTURA COUNTY FARMERS FACE WORST LOSS SINCE '90.Byline: David Greenberg The creator of this article, or someone who has substantially contributed to it, may have a conflict of interest regarding its subject matter. It may require cleanup to comply with Wikipedia's content policies, particularly neutral point of view. Daily News Staff Writer Having lost $51 million in crops to El Nino storms and nearly $75 million more destroyed by a December cold snap cold snap Noun a short period of cold and frosty weather Noun 1. cold snap - a spell of cold weather cold spell , Ventura County farmers may remember 1998 as one of the worst years ever for the county's No. 1 industry. Farmers fought the Dec. 20-24 cold snap with wind machines and irrigation irrigation, in agriculture, artificial watering of the land. Although used chiefly in regions with annual rainfall of less than 20 in. (51 cm), it is also used in wetter areas to grow certain crops, e.g., rice. , but still reported $74.3 million in damage to oranges, lemons and avocados. Coupled with El Nino-related damage, including $31.2 million from a storm on Feb. 23, the agriculture industry lost $125.3 million worth of crops in the county last year. The last time Ventura County saw such a devastating dev·as·tate tr.v. dev·as·tat·ed, dev·as·tat·ing, dev·as·tates 1. To lay waste; destroy. 2. To overwhelm; confound; stun: was devastated by the rude remark. loss was Dec. 21-22, 1990, when frost killed off $128 million worth of 700 local growers' citrus and avocado crops. ``It's obviously a big loss,'' said W. Earl McPhail, county agricultural commissioner. ``This is definitely the worst freeze we've had since 1990.'' Last month's freeze, which also destroyed about $600 million in crops in the San Joaquin Valley Noun 1. San Joaquin Valley - a vast valley in central California known for its rich farmland Calif., California, Golden State, CA - a state in the western United States on the Pacific; the 3rd largest state; known for earthquakes , drove navel orange prices from 69 cents to as much as $1.79 a pound at local stores. Wholesale avocado prices remain stable at about $40 per 25-pound box since most of the harvesting now is in the San Diego area, which escaped the freeze. In Ventura County, nearly all of the damage last month occurred in the Santa Rosa Valley and areas west of Santa Paula. A steady breeze coming off the Santa Clara River Santa Clara River may refer to:
``It could have been much worse,'' McPhail said. ``There's still a lot of good fruit out there. Compared to the San Joaquin Valley, we came through this very well.'' |
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