My one attempt at growing an olive failed, but they are such striking looking tree that I'm going to try again.

http://www.abcactionnews.com/dpp/news/region_polk/lake_alfred/florida-citrus-growers-explore-opportunities-in-olive-production

Florida citrus growers explore opportunities in olive production

CA olive experts provided seminar to growers
Posted: 7:27 PM
Last Updated: 7 hours and 49 minutes ago

By: Ryan Raiche

LAKE ALFRED, Fla. - Citrus growers from around the state are exploring a new option that may complement the production of oranges.

On Thursday, the University of Florida Citrus Research and Education Center in Lake Alfred brought in experts on olive production from California.

Doctor Jackie Burns, director of the center, says many citrus growers came to her with inquiries on growing the crop.

“I think our citrus growers are very much innovative,” she said. “They are thinking of ways to always fill their land, and create more opportunities for themselves.”

Between citrus greening disease and the latest PR problem with imported orange juice, citrus growers have had a tough few years, and many are not shying away from new opportunities.

Growers who attended Thursday’s seminar got to try a variety of olives, taste olive oil, and learn what it will take to tap into the market.

The experts said there is a demand for domestically grown olives because most are imported from other parts of the world.

But growing this crop comes with its fair share of risk.

“This is not a slam dunk, because this is a really peculiar crop that needs really specific things in order to flower and fruit,” said Paul Vossen, a farm advisor from California.

Vossen said that olives thrive in a dry climate where it’s not too hot and not too cold. He also said a rain during bloom season could wipe out the crop.

The risk is worth a shot for Darren and Heather Jackson who plan to get into the olive industry here in Florida.

“We just love olives,” Darren said. “There’s always a risk with anything you do, especially farming, so we’re just trying to do as much research as we can ahead of time, and minimize the risk as much as possible.”

If all goes as planned, the Jackson’s will start planting olive trees on 18 acres of their farm, Suwannee River Olives in Mayo, FL.

It will take about three years before the trees produce a crop. If successful, the Jacksons plan to expand to up to 200 acres.

http://www2.jcfloridan.com/news/2012/jan/31/researchers-tour-green-gate-olive-grove-ar-3140968/

Researchers tour Green Gate Olive Grove
By: Deborah Buckhalter | Jackson County Floridan
Published: January 31, 2012

Several researchers from universities in California and the University of Florida in Gainesville were at a local olive grove Monday, taking notes and pictures for a seminar to be held at Lake Alfred, near Lakeland, next month.

South Florida growers are interested in exploring whether olives could be a viable alternative crop for them, something they could grow to help offset their woes when traditional citrus products have problems.

For Green Gate Olive Grove owner Don Mueller, it was a dream come true on two fronts.

For one thing, he got to meet the two people he considers the premier authors of “the bibles” on olive and olive oil production. Mueller said he’s studied their volumes more than once since he started his five-acre olive orchard at Compass Lake in the Hills near Alford.

The writers he admires, Louise Ferguson and Paul Vossen, are both from the University of California Davis (UC Davis) Cooperative Extension. Vossen is a farm advisor with a specialty in olive oil production. Ferguson is the director of Fruit and Nut Research and Information Center for the Extension. The two are counterparts of the people at the University of Florida Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences, which has research and education centers in Jackson and Gadsden counties as well as in Gainesville and elsewhere.

Ferguson and Jackie Burns of the IFAS Citrus Research and Education Center in Lake Alfred share information as colleagues in the field. It was through Burns that Ferguson and Vossen came to learn of Mueller’s grove. The colleagues put together a trip after it became clear that the producers downstate were getting more and more serious about the possibility of growing olives.

The California team works closely with olive producers in the Sonoma Valley and elsewhere, and is here learning more about Mueller’s Florida operation, as are Burns and others who came on the tour. Accompanying them were Rob Trawick of the Marianna IFAS, Charles Brasher, retired from that unit, and Ron Harrell, who assists Mueller and is something of an apprentice in that helping role, as he wants to start his own grove in nearby Washington County.

To have such a team assembled looking seriously at olives as a possible new mass-produced crop for Florida is a dream Mueller has expressed often since he began. He regularly gives tours of his facility, both to the general public and to researchers, and is eager to share all he knows of the particular growing conditions, challenges and advantages as they exist in north Florida.

Mueller spend most of Monday morning with the team, and said he hopes more will come and that the idea of Florida as an olive state takes root.

http://www.theledger.com/article/20120203/NEWS/120209767/1178?Title=Olive-Production-Citrus-Growers-Explore-Alternative-Crops-for-Grove-Land-

Olive Production: Citrus Growers Explore Alternative Crops for Grove Land
By Kevin Bouffard
THE LEDGER
Published: Friday, February 3, 2012 at 11:54 p.m.
Last Modified: Friday, February 3, 2012 at 11:54 p.m.


Mission olives hang in the olive
orchard at Lodestar Farms in
Oroville, Calif. Polk growers have
expressed an interest in growing
olives on grove land, but climate
and summer rains may pose a
challenge.
(JASON HALLEY | THE ASSOCIATED
PRESS (2006))

LAKE ALFRED | If you're thinking about growing olives in Florida, beware of Greeks bearing advice.

Greece, Spain and Italy lead the world in olive production, and growers in each country think their methods and tree varieties work the best, said Paul Vossen, a University of California extension agent and an authority on growing olives.

"The way to know if it works well for you is to plant them (olive trees) and see how they grow," Vossen said Thursday to about 150 attendees of a seminar on the "Potential for Producing Olives in Florida" at the Citrus Research and Education Center in Lake Alfred. "Don't get caught by someone in the Old World saying this the best and only way to do it. It's not."

Jackie Burns, director of the Lake Alfred center, said it sponsored the seminar in response to requests from citrus growers exploring alternative crops for their grove land. As part of her research on mechanical harvesting, Burns spent a six-month sabbatical in California focusing on the olive industry.

"We're not just citrus," Burns said. "We promote agriculture in Florida, and this is one way to do it."

At least one participant will act on Vossen's challenge.

"If we can get a decent table olive crop, it will be something else to sell," said Thomas Mack, owner of Florida-Citrus.com Inc., a Lakeland-based gift fruit shipper.

The global olive industry is divided between growers who supply the fruit for oil and whole fruit in bottles or cans, called table olives.

Mack has been looking for alternative crops for his 44-acre citrus grove near Zellwood, which he lost to freezes during the past two years, he said. He plans to plant 2,000 to 3,000 olive trees of several different varieties later this year on about five acres.

Mack said he has been researching olive growing in Florida for more than a year before the seminar, including consultations with the other presenter, Louise Ferguson, an extension specialist at the University of California at Davis. He was undeterred by the many challenges to growing olives Ferguson and Vossen discussed for more than three hours.

"The reality is the riskiness of the environment (for growing) is always going to be there," Mack said. "We knew we had these hurdles to overcome."

Currently California dominates the U.S. olive industry with about 30,000 acres for oil and 20,000 acres for table olives, Vossen said. Other states, including Florida, have about 3,000 commercial acres.

That compares to Spain with 6 million acres, Tunisia with 3.8 million acres, Italy with 3.5 million acres and Greece 2.5 million of the world's 24 million olive acres. The Mediterranean area dominates production, but countries such as Australia, Argentina and Chile have successfully developed olive growing.

But the opportunity awaits because of the rising popularity of olive oil consumption in the U.S., currently at 70 million gallons a year, nearly double 1990 consumption, Vossen said. The U.S. would need 300,000 olive acres to supply just current consumption.

One of the biggest pitfalls for Florida olive growing would seem to be spring and summer rains, Feguson and Vossen said.

Olive trees prefer an arid climate because the olive blooms rely on wind-born pollination during the late spring and early summer to produce fruit, they said. Significant rain during that period will cause the pollen to clump up and fall uselessly to the ground.

"If you get rain during bloom, you're not going to get many olives," said Vossen, who drew a loud laugh with that remark.

Olive trees are also very sensitive to cold and to sudden changes in climate, Ferguson said. Like citrus trees, olive tree damage begins at temperatures below 29 degrees.

Also like citrus trees, olive trees need to go dormant during winter, she said. For olives, that requires 200 to 400 "chill hours" below 45 degrees for a 10-week period.

But abnormally high or low temperatures during those 10 weeks will interrupt the dormancy cycle, meaning the tree must begin a new 200-400-hour chill period, Ferguson said.

"That (rain) is actually the biggest ringer in this whole thing. You could have ideal growing conditions and get two or three days of rain, then you're ruined," Vossen told The Ledger after the seminar. "This is not a slam-dunk."

[ Kevin Bouffard can be reached at kevin.bouffard@theledger.com or at 863-422-6800. Read more on Florida citrus on his Facebook page, Florida Citrus Witness, http://bit.ly/baxWuU. ]