January 11, 2010
Mark Krzos, and Dennis Culver
The News-Press
Devastation.
That was the word farmer Frank Oakes used to describe the impact a second night of cold temperatures will have on crops throughout Florida.
Photo: Ice covers an orange tree Monday morning in a grove along Spring Lake Highway in Hernando County. Some growers turn on sprinklers to create the ice and help protect the trees from freezing temperatures. (Maurice Rivenbark)
“It’s been like a prize fight with one fighter jabbing and jabbing at another fighter who was defenseless,” Oakes said shortly after he arrived at his farm not far from the Corkscrew Swamp Sanctuary this morning. “And last night was the knockout blow.
“When I got up this morning and saw the stars, I knew we were in big trouble,” he said. “Saturday night, you couldn’t have scripted it any better. There was a nice breeze and no frost, but when I saw that temperatures hit 21 in Immokalee this morning, I knew it wouldn’t be good.”
Over the past 20 years, Oakes said he’s seen temperatures go below freezing, but that lasted only a night or two. “We’ve had cold temperatures for nearly a week,” he said. “The plants are stressed and I think anyone with tomatoes, eggplants and bell peppers is in serious trouble. They’re gone for sure.”
With frost over the plants and icicles dangling from the sprinklers, Oakes surveyed his crop of strawberries. He believes they have fared the cold well. “We’ve been able to keep them watered,” he said.
But the rest of his farm, the outlook isn’t as rosy.
“There’s no way we’re going to make any money this year,” he said.
-- Mark Krzos, mkrzos@news-press.com
7:36 a.m. update
Sisters Angelee Delarosa, 12, and Riana Garcia, 8, could see their breath this morning as Delarosa walked her sister to the bus stop.
The two would normally wait for the bus at the stop in Cape Coral, but they decided to keep moving around to stay warm in the frigid temperatures.
"It's freezing out here," Garcia said as the two walked along SW 19th Street. "I didn't want to get up for school."
Garcia noted she wished she would have worn a heavier coat this morning to prepare for the weather. She was hoping school might be canceled today.
7:30 a.m. update: Mostly smooth sailing at airport
Cold temperatures across the country don’t appear to be having a major impact on flights arriving and departing from Southwest Florida International Airport this morning.
There are a handful of morning departing and arriving flights that have been delayed by minutes, but most flights after 7:30 a.m. are expected to be on time.
-- Dennis Culver, dculver@news-press.com
6:46 a.m. update: Some in Lee County still without power
With power usage at a high because of cold weather, Florida Power and Light is dealing with power outages to almost 1,400 power outages in Lee and Collier counties.
Close to 600 Lee County customers and 800 customers in Collier County are affected.
Meanwhile, The National Weather Service has issued a freeze warning for parts of Lee County and surrounding areas until at least 9 this morning.
There will also be a freeze warning in effect from 10 tonight until 9 a.m. Tuesday.
WINK-TV meteorologist Brian Monahan said the low temperatures in the day are expected to come around 7:30 a.m.
As of 6 a.m., the low in Fort Myers was 31 degrees, breaking the record of 32 degrees set in 1959.
In Lehigh temperatures are in the upper 20s.
Inland areas of Southwest Florida are in the midst of a hard freeze with temperatures of 28 degrees or lower for four or more hours.
There is potential for damage to citrus crops in Highlands and Glades counties.
A wind chill advisory is in effect this morning with a north wind around five to 10 mph.
The wind chill is making temperatures feel like they are in the mid 20s.
It will get warmer, but still cold, as the day goes on with a highs expected to be in the mid to upper 50s, which is not expected to be a low max. It will be sunny all day.
Temperatures should reach the 60s on Tuesday and Wednesday and the 70s on Thursday.
-- Dennis Culver, dculver@news-press.com
6:30 a.m. update: Collier farmer: 'Never seen' anything like this
It’s just before daybreak and Rene Garza, an employee of the Oakes Farm in Collier County is huddled close to a farm a mere 10 yards from fields of covered strawberries, peppers, tomatoes and eggplants.
He’s on the phone to his boss, Frank Oakes, and both seem concerned about how their crops fared after the second night of freezing temperatures.
“All the pipes to the field are frozen,” Garza said. “In my 20 years here, I’ve never seen nothing like it. Everything is frozen, even the hose that leads to the sink over there.”
The crops, Garza said, fared well Saturday night but wasn’t sure if they survived a second night.
“We’ll see,” he said.
Oakes is expected to arrive at the farm near the Corkscrew Swamp Sanctuary by 7 a.m.
-- Mark Krzos, mkrzos@news-press.com
From this morning on news-press.com
The worst of Deep Freeze 2010 appears to be over, certainly none too soon for Bonita Springs farmer Mike Clevenger, who owns 40 acres of crops in Bonita Springs and 300 more in Immokalee.
Area farmers have been battling frost and near-freezing temperatures since late December, but a warming trend looms and Southwest Florida should finally see 70-degree temperatures and near-normal weather by the end of the week.
Clevenger, who has monitored his crops until the wee hours for the past 12 days, never has been more excited to see things warm up.
“This (cold) is never-ending,” said Clevenger, who lost about 40 acres of cucumbers Wednesday. “I promise you: This has been 12 days of hell.
It’s been unbelievable. I’ve been down here since 1980 and I’ve never seen anything like this.”
The area’s agriculture industry survived a frigid Saturday night/Sunday morning when it didn’t get quite as cold as predicted because of cloud cover. The overnight low was 33 degrees, recorded at 3:55 a.m.
After 8 a.m. Saturday temperatures never left the 30s, according to WINK-TV meteorologist Lauren Casey.
“It was 52 at midnight, and then it kept getting colder,” Casey said. “You can say it was one of the coldest, if not the coldest, day ever in Fort Myers.”
The lowest high-low ever recorded here was 40 degrees in 1895.
Clevenger was ecstatic that his fields were not damaged in Sunday morning’s brutal conditions.
“To not lose a crop last night was a miracle in itself,” Clevenger said Sunday.
South Fort Myers farmer Sandy Biggar, who has been farming locally since the 1970s, didn’t lose any crops as of Sunday morning either
But Biggar, who owns 53 acres of tomatoes on his Gladiolus Drive farm, remains vigilant about his precious crops. He said a hard freeze — temperatures of 26 degrees for five consecutive hours — could cripple his entire investment.
Because temperatures were forecast to fall into the 20s by early this morning, Biggar sprayed his tomatoes with a weather protectant Sunday.
The protectant is supposed to keep tomatoes 2 degrees warmer than the actual temperature.
“We’ll see what happens,” Biggar said. “I think (this morning) is going to be the worst of the bunch.”
National Weather Service meteorologist John McMichael said warmer days will soon be here, for the time being.
“It should be in the mid-70s by Friday afternoon,” McMichael said.
He said a large ridge of Arctic air parked over the southern Mississippi River valley will begin moving east and that will allow an easterly air flow to begin warming Southwest Florida.
Both Florida Power & Light and Lee County Electric Cooperative have set usage records the past two days — demand that led to some power outages in the county.
At 8 p.m. Sunday, about 1,100 of FPL’s 230,000 customers in Lee were without power, according to company spokeswoman Jackie Anderson. This was after Lee County customers broke a usage record Saturday that was set in 2005, Anderson said.
Some of those without power had been dark for more than 12 hours because of problems such as blown transformers.
One customer whose residence was blacked out, Rochelle Holt of south Fort Myers, said it was particularly frustrating because her neighbors across the street had power.
“The power went out at about 7 a.m.,” Holt said, and four houses on her side of Coral Isle Court in Parker Lakes still did not have electricity at 10 p.m. Sunday.
“They told me at first we would get power by 10:30 this morning,” Hold said. “Then they said they weren’t sure when we’d get it back.”
For the second consecutive day Sunday, LCEC set an all-time record for power usage. LCEC, which serves about 194,000 customers, set the record at 9 a.m. Sunday when 1048 megawatts were used, spokeswoman Karen Ryan said. The previous record was 940 megawatts.
LCEC had isolated power outages throughout Sunday partially due to people turning on their heaters, Ryan said. Isolated customers in Marco Island, Sanibel, Cape Coral and North Fort Myers lost power Sunday, Ryan added.
“But we didn’t have any major outages,” Ryan said.
FPL’s Anderson said the company has about 1,300 workers throughout the state tending to power outages.
The worst of Deep Freeze 2010 appears to be over, certainly none too soon for Bonita Springs farmer Mike Clevenger, who owns 40 acres of crops in Bonita Springs and 300 more in Immokalee.
Area farmers have been battling frost and near-freezing temperatures since late December, but a warming trend looms and Southwest Florida should finally see 70-degree temperatures and near-normal weather by the end of the week.
Clevenger, who has monitored his crops until the wee hours for the past 12 days, never has been more excited to see things warm up.
“This (cold) is never-ending,” said Clevenger, who lost about 40 acres of cucumbers Wednesday. “I promise you: This has been 12 days of hell.
“I’ve been down here since 1980 and I’ve never seen anything like this.”
The area’s agriculture industry survived a frigid Saturday night/Sunday morning when it didn’t get quite as cold as predicted because of cloud cover. The overnight low was 33 degrees recorded at 3:55 a.m.
After 8 a.m. Saturday temperatures never left the 30s, according to WINK-TV meteorologist Lauren Casey.
“It was 52 at midnight, and then it kept getting colder,” Casey said. “You can say it was one of the coldest, if not the coldest day ever in Fort Myers.”
The lowest high-low ever recorded here was 40 degrees in 1895.
Clevenger was ecstatic that his fields were not damaged in Sunday morning’s brutal conditions.
“To not lose a crop last night was a miracle in itself,” Clevenger said Sunday.
South Fort Myers farmer Sandy Biggar, who has been farming locally since the 1970s, didn’t lose any crops as of Sunday morning either.
But Biggar, who owns 53 acres of tomatoes on his Gladiolus Drive farm, remains vigilant about his precious crops. He said a hard freeze — temperatures of 26 degrees for five consecutive hours — could cripple his entire investment.
Because temperatures were forecast to fall into the 20s by early this morning, Biggar sprayed his tomatoes with a weather protectant Sunday.
The protectant is supposed to keep tomatoes 2 degrees warmer than the actual temperature.
“We’ll see what happens,” Biggar said. “I think (this morning) is going to be the worst of the bunch.”
National Weather Service meteorologist John McMichael said warmer days will soon be here, for the time being.
“It should be in the mid 70s by Friday afternoon,” McMichael said.
He said a large ridge of arctic air parked over the southern Mississippi River valley will begin moving east and that will allow an easterly air flow to begin warming Southwest Florida.
Both Florida Power & Light and Lee County Electric Cooperative have set usage records the past two day — demand that led to some power outages throughout the county.
At 8 p.m. Sunday, about 1,100 of FPL’s 230,000 customers were without power, according to company spokeswoman Jackie Anderson. This was after Lee County customers broke a usage record Saturday that was set in 2005, Anderson said.
Some of those without power had been dark for more than 12 hours because of problems such as blown transformers.
One blacked-out customer, Rochelle Holt of south Fort Myers, said it was particularly frustrating because her neighbors across the street had power.
“The power went out at about 7 a.m.,” Holt said, and four houses on her side of Coral Isle Court in Parker Lakes still did not have electricity at 10 p.m. Sunday.
“They told me at first we would get power by 10:30 this morning,” Hold said. “Then they said they weren’t sure when we’d get it back.”
For the second consecutive day Sunday, LCEC set an all-time record for power usage. LCEC, which serves about 194,000 customers, set the record at 9 a.m. Sunday when 1048 megawatts were used, spokeswoman Karen Ryan said. The previous record was 940 megawatts.
LCEC had isolated power outages throughout Sunday partially due to people turning on their heaters, Ryan said. Isolated customers in Marco Island, Sanibel, Cape Coral and North Fort Myers lost power Sunday, Ryan added.
“But we didn’t have any major outages,” Ryan said.
FPL’s Anderson said the company has about 1,300 workers throughout the state tending to power outages.
http://www.news-press.com/print/article/20100111/NEWS01/301110002/Lee-County-cold-weather-Farmer-Last-night-was-knockout-blow