Florida Growers Reporting Ice Damage to Orange Crop

Citrus growers in central Florida reported ice damage to their orange fruit and groves Wednesday after overnight temperatures dropped to bone-chilling lows in some areas of the citrus belt.

“There was definitely some damage,” said Ray Royce, executive director of the Highlands County Citrus Growers Association in central Florida.

“We did have some areas that had damage last night,” Royce said.

“It’s too early to tell whether or not we’ll have significant fruit drop but certainly we’re going to have juice loss within some fruit in some areas,” he added.

Overnight temperatures fell well below freezing in Highlands, the second-largest citrus producing county in the Sunshine State, which yields more than 75 percent of the U.S. orange crop and accounts for about 40 percent of the world’s orange juice supply.

Typically, citrus can be damaged by four hours or more of temperatures below 28 degrees Fahrenheit , and Royce saide that was exactly what happened Tuesday night and well into Wednesday morning.

“I don’t think it’s to the level of being catastrophic tree killing cold anywhere, but we certainly are going to see some damage coming out of last night,” he said.

“It is not fruit frozen in every single grove. it is notsmall twig damage everywhere, but there’s definitely some blocks that are going to have damaged fruit,” he added.

Highlands County Growers Association represents 185 members in the geographic center of Florida’s world-renowned citrus region.

Royce said his damage assessment, while still preliminary, was based on checks with growers scattered across some 40,000 acres of orange groves across the county.

[Florida growers experienced freezing temperatures this past January as well.]

(Reporting by Tom Brown; editing by John Picinich)