Sonoma County has been the egg basket to the world, the hop capital and prune belt of California and a prime fruit supplier to our troops during World War II. From its earliest days of Mexican and European settlers and farmers, our abundant and fertile region has ranked as a top ag producing county in the United States.
Last year, more ag history was made when the total value of the county’s farming production and crops exceeded $1 billion for the first time. The production of grapes, apples, milk, eggs, cut flowers, meat animals, field grains and more totaled $1.106 billion, a 24% increase over the previous year, boosted primarily by a record heavy winegrape crop and steady prices in other crop categories.
The 2018 growing season was a long one with nearly ideal conditions of generous early spring rains, a mild summer and a dry and extended fall harvest. Thousands of farmers and agricultural workers got the job done, but Mother Nature, once again, deserves the most credit.
From the earliest farming days here — at least up to right now — Mother Nature has been the most consistent element of our great agricultural successes and heritage. Our temperate Mediterranean-like climate, ample water and fertile soils have afforded us a rich succession of crops and premier farm products and successful industries. Countering these cycles of nature, human population shifts, global competition and periods of blight and disease also have shaped the history of our farms and farmers.
Until 1987, the local dairy industry was the dominant sector of the county’s ag economy when winegrape values first topped milk, butter and cheese production. At one time prunes rivaled dairy values and poultry and eggs have always been important to the overall local economy — there were 2.4 million laying chickens in Sonoma County last year.
Now, our long and evolving ag history may be facing abrupt and uncertain impacts and changes against which even Mother Nature will be defenseless. With the multiple looming threats of climate change, traumatic weather events and possibly more wildfires and droughts, can Sonoma County’s growers and ag producers continue to expect $1 billion crops in coming years? We already know some grape varietals will lose production if we lose too many foggy nights and cool mornings. Apples need “chill hours” during the winter and too many hot days at anytime means extra loss of water to evaporation and urban use.
No two years have ever been the same or predictable. Even a short heat spike or untimely rainstorm could mean millions of dollars of lost crop or farm production. We’ve seen this many times but now we are being promised we will see more climate emergencies and extremes.
In past eras, such as when a fungus blight wiped out commercial hop production here in the 1940s and 1950s, hop growers knew they could plant their lands over to winegrapes and be promised a reliable crop. The same thing happened when our local Gravenstein and other apple crops began losing significant market share to Pacific Northwest and China competition. Thousands of acres of orchards have been planted over to premium winegrape varietals, making more money for farmers than apples ever paid. Total acreage of local apple orchards is now only 2,166 acres, down from a zenith of 14,000 acres in the 1940s.
Once upon a time there were as many as 800 dairy farms in the county. Last year, the official crop report counted only 56, of which 47 were certified organic. Sonoma County is home to 30,000 dairy cows. There are individual dairy operations in Fresno just over half that size.
Sonoma County farmers have shown great resiliency by diversifying crops, innovating farm practices, doing cooperative and creative marketing and stubbornly holding on to vital ag roots and family-farm traditions.
Will all this be enough in the face of a compromised and distraught Mother Nature?
— Rollie Atkinson
