“It was a so-so year overall, but for a so-so year, we did pretty well, said McPhail. “I was a little surprised we were up $6 million from last year,” said McPhail. “If it wasn’t for the strawberries and nursery stock the report probably would have been down significantly.”But, “my single biggest surprise was the return on strawberries; I figured they would be strong,” as prices jumped and acreage devoted to the crop climbed to 7,700. “That’s a lot of strawberries. . .”Although Valencia’s are being abandoned, “I see very, very few lemons being pulled out,” McPhail noted. “I see lemons, avocados and nursery being our basic crops,” in the river valley. With Valencia’s, “Most of the valley from here to the east of Santa Paula are fairly old, 70 to 80 years, and the quality isn’t there. Where growers make money is in the box, not juice,” the common end product of Valencia’s.McPhail predicted that Ventura County, which has an impressive average return of about $1,500 an acre, would continue to rank statewide in the top 10 counties.Rounding out the 2001 top 10 crops were: 6th, cut flowers, $51,717,000; 7th, tomatoes, 32,539,000; 8th, Valencia oranges; 9th broccoli, 14,349,000; 10th, lettuce, $12,621,000.
Strawberries rank 1st in 2001 Crop Report
August 14, 2002
Santa Paula News
Strawberries kicked the pulp out of lemons, recapturing a rare first place ranking in the annual Crop Report, which showed that the 2001 market was the best ever for the sweet fruit due to high demand and even higher prices.
By Peggy KellySanta Paula TimesStrawberries kicked the pulp out of lemons, recapturing a rare first place ranking in the annual Crop Report, which showed that the 2001 market was the best ever for the sweet fruit due to high demand and even higher prices.“For the second time in some 50 years, lemons were not the top crop,” of 2001, which overall broke the $1 billion income mark for the third year in a row, noted Ventura County Agricultural Commissioner Earl McPhail. It was a year when “the prices weren’t there. . .”Avocados held steady in fifth place with a 2001 value of $67,255,000 - a sharp drop from the 2000 figure of $73,071,000 -while nursery stock soared to third place, displacing celery’s $141,550,000 2001 value.The 2001 lemon crop was valued at $173,675,000 compared to the 2000 figure of $187,166,000. Strawberries were slightly behind in 2000 at $186,602,000, but the red menace spiraled to $230,697,000 during 2001.Nursery stock finished the year at third, with a crop valued at $171,294,000, a natural progression for a commodity finding new ground displacing Valencia oranges, especially in the Santa Clara River Valley. After years of decline, Valencia’s rallied with a 2001 value of $27,403,000, an impressive increase over the $16,100,000 dribbled out in 2000.
