Florida Citrus Crisis

Right now, the news is currently informing America and beyond that our orange season has been one of the worst seasons yet and doing their best job to instill fear to anyone listening. The reality is that we are getting out butts kicked thanks to something called, ‘citrus greening’ which is a disease caused by a bacterium that causes the beginning signs of yellow leaves and mottling.

The reality is as usual, hidden from the public eye and instead of the orange juice industry fixing this problem, which they’ve known about for generations now, they keep kicking the can down the road and coming up with temporary solutions. So, here’s the reality of many agricultural “farms” across the United States, they are monocropping and going against natures design expecting that things will just pan out for them, rather than looking at the problem from a multi-faceted perspective. It doesn’t matter if you mono crop lettuce, carrots, or orange trees, it’s not natural and invites all sorts of problems to sashay themselves into the planting areas.

Keep in mind that this plague upon our citrus industry affects all varieties of citrus, not just oranges. So, when you see prices for lemons, limes, grapefruit, and all manner of oranges increasing in price, you can thank the poor practices of the industry. When you hear of shortages or visit the grocery store and see that for multiple weeks they are not carrying a certain citrus product, you now know why.

Now if you were to possibly get invited to take a stroll through these citrus groves, it’s nothing like the popular orange juice commercials you see on tv. The current model sees high steep hills where rows of oranges trees are spaced apart in neat little rows and generally there are miles of soaker hoses positioned to water these trees. What might not stand out immediately to most non-ag folks is that there is usually not a single blade of grass or patch of wildflowers underneath these trees.

Why is there no grass or wildflowers? That’s because they heavily spray these trees with herbicides and pesticides. There is nothing living underneath them that is capable of surviving. The day after they spray, anything that was green the day before begins its descent into death as the leaves turn from green to brown. Down in the gullies below the mounded hills you will likely find not only chemical run off but invasive flora that have taken root.

The solution to the citrus greening is to drill a hole into the citrus tree and inject a solution of antibacterial medication and hope that it works. It’s not like we have proof that senseless overuse of antibacterials ever caused a problem anywhere, right? The fix they are using is truly a band aid solution that leaves a gaping wound underneath.

The real solution that I would recommend would be to cease and desist on the use of unnecessary chemicals and get back to a natural order of things. Trees that are barren around their roots do poorly and a nice thick layer of mulch goes a long way in preserving water down around the roots. In addition to thickly layered mulch, I would recommend bringing ducks, geese, peacocks, chickens and guineas into the orchards and allow the fowl to do what they do. In addition to these suggestions, I recommend removing every other citrus tree and replacing it with guava as they have a protective nature around citrus. These two trees have shown great promise in protecting a variety of citrus species. And yes, it would obviously take time for the industry to recover but by the time the next generation is ready to take over the reins we could make some real progress and give them a future rebounded industry.

I personally have oranges, lemons and limes on my property, and they are all in the vicinity of oak trees and are heavily mulched. I can assure you that they are healthy plants and will hopefully continue to be. If you decide to plant citrus in your food forest, be sure to buy from a reputable Florida nursery that has healthy looking plants. Don’t hesitate to ask the people working at the nursery about citrus greening and the plants that they are selling.