Citrus greening’s toll mounts.

Nearly a decade into the era of the bacterial disease citrus greening, Florida growers are pondering the question: Is there a future in Florida citrus?

The question has taken on more urgency following the past two seasons of unprecedented pre-harvest fruit drop from diseased trees.

“It’s a plague of biblical proportions,” said Scott Young, 57, an Alturas-based grower with 350 grove acres in Polk County, referring to the toll citrus greening has taken on his harvests the past two seasons. “It’s already critical. We’re still in it, but we’re clawing to hang on.”

As a third-generation citrus grower whose family business stretches to the 1930s, Young is committed to hanging on for another season or two, he said, because growing citrus is the only occupation he knows. But he’s not optimistic, and neither are many of his fellow growers.

“For the first time ever in the citrus industry, you see despair because we’ve tried everything, and there’s no silver bullet on the horizon,” Young said. “This is doomsday; this is going to kill us.”

Just getting by for the next couple of seasons will mean downsizing, selling some of his best groves to raise the upfront cash needed for grove caretaking costs before more revenue comes in with the new fall harvest, Young said.

The rise in pessimism about the future of Florida citrus comes after growers hoped they could manage greening’s deleterious effects through the decade, long enough to allow scientists to come up with a better strategy for counteracting or even curing the disease. Pre-harvest drop, which surfaced during the 2012-13 season, dashed such hopes.

“Two years ago, the industry was thinking we’ve got a Band-Aid and the crops were going to hold up,” said Tom Spreen, emeritus professor of agricultural economics at the University of Florida in Gainesville and an authority on Florida citrus. “I think what’s changed here is the expectation. I don’t think anybody had foreseen production falling off the map theway it has.”

Although still bullish on Florida citrus, Ben Hill Griffin III agreed that the growers’ mood has turned sour.

“There’s a lot more pessimism in the citrus industry today because of pre-harvest drop,” said Griffin, CEO of Ben Hill Griffin Inc. in Frostproof, one of the state’s biggest growers, whose family firm dates to the 1930s.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture initially estimated 125 million orange boxes in the 2013-14 season. It finished with just 104.3 million boxes of oranges, nearly 17 percent less. Those averages mask more severe drop problems among some growers like Young.

Young reported that 2012-13 orange production in his groves declined 50 percent from the previous season largely because of pre-harvest drop, despite the fact that he took all recommended caretaking measures against greening. The drop problem grew worse this past season with production off 70 percent, Young said. Before greening, pre-harvest drop attributable to weather, pests and other diseases amounted to about 5 percent of his crop, he added.

Pre-harvest drop has caused the Florida Department of Citrus to reduce its 10-year projection of the state’s citrus harvest drastically. Previous 10-year projections, updated annually, had accounted for declining production because of greening but had not accounted for pre-harvest drop. Whereas earlier projections put next season’s orange crop at 138.2 million boxes, the revision done earlier this year puts the 2014-15 harvest at 106.6 million boxes, or 23 percent smaller, according to a report prepared by Matt Salois, the department’s chief economist until his June resignation.

The new projection for the orange crop in 10 years is 85.4 million boxes, down 32 percent from the previous estimate of 125.6 million boxes.