Cut flowers are becoming a larger part of Santa Barbara County's agricultural output, even though overall greenhouse operations and the number of acres in production shrank slightly last year.

Lilies, roses, tulips, delphiniums and snapdragons pushed up in the ranking of the top 30 products generating more than $1 million in value last year, as vegetables like cauliflower, cabbage and spinach dropped in value, along with lemons and cattle.

Greenhouse area devoted to cut flowers fell by 473,735 square feet last year, and 1.6 fewer acres of field space was devoted to the crop.

Yet the total value of cut flowers rose by about $1 million, from nearly $94.5 million to just less than $95.5 million.

Agriculture officials say growers are planting new varieties to compete with cheaper imports coming up from Central America and South America.

Guy Tingos, the county's deputy agriculture commissioner with 20-plus years of experience, said chrysanthemums, roses and baby's breath used to be the leading cut flowers.

But now, flowers such as dahlias and larkspur are gaining footholds in the local industry.

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For example, for the first time, dahlias made the list of million-dollar producers on the 2006 Agricultural Production Report.

Usually, at least five growers have to be producing a specific variety before it gets listed separately, Tingos said.

That's to protect business confidentiality, he explained. With fewer than five, it would be too easy for growers to figure out how much business their competitors are doing.

That could explain why some cut-flower growers - especially in the Carpinteria area - are tight-lipped about what they're growing and where their industry is headed.

Several Carpinteria area growers either declined to discuss the industry or didn't return phone calls. One grower said that's to be expected.

“We're kind of a little fish bowl here,” explained Karen Graf of Hilltop Flowers in Carpinteria, who declined to even say what the company grows.

But she said Hilltop Flowers is not expanding the varieties it produces: “Probably, if anything, we're not growing things we used to grow.

“In this industry, it's hard to be on the cutting edge because everything is already being done elsewhere,” she explained. “You can only invent so many flowers.”

Instead, she said, the company is trying to be more efficient and “grow things well.”

More efficiency could help account for the greater value coming from less growing area as well as the higher prices commanded by less common varieties that aren't flooding in as imports.

Glad-A-Way Gardens, on East Clark Avenue in Orcutt, is considering expanding its line of products, but that's not to compete with cheaper imports.

Instead, it would be to supply Por La Mar Nursery, with which the farm became associated after it was purchased by new owners three years ago, said Froylan Vasquez, general manager and vice president.

Glad-A-Way's main products are its own varieties of gladiolus, harvested from about May through December, and orchidiola - a hybrid of iris and gladiolus - harvested from about December through May.

But to supply Por La Mar, the company is testing some other lines, he said.

Vasquez also said growers in Central America and South America are having their own problems, which is helping the cut-flower growers along the California coast.

“They're having problems with viruses, and even in the South and on the East Coast they're having problems,” he said. “So on this side of the country, the growers are adding a few more acres.”

Around Lompoc, many of the flower growers focus on producing seeds rather than cut flowers. The number of harvested acres of flower seed grew slightly last year, and the value rose by almost $100,000.

But in the Lompoc area, there's been a public perception that falling demand for seeds has the growers converting to cut flowers. That's not quite accurate, said Jack Bodger, owner of Bodger Seeds.

“That's a pretty broad statement,” Bodger said. “In reality, the flower seed producers in the Lompoc Valley - and there are three farms - all three are continuing with business as usual.

“The long-term trend is that seed production has been in decline gradually and cut-flower production ... certainly has become a large activity in the Lompoc Valley,” he said. “But I wouldn't say much has changed in the last few years.”

He said Bodger has no plans to produce cut flowers. “That's just not our focus. We're just not interested in that.”

But the company, which on Saturday opened its doors to the public for its annual tours, has expanded somewhat beyond producing just seeds.

“In general, everyone is looking for something new in the industry,” Bodger said. “So five or six years ago, we started producing some varieties from cuttings. That's a new direction for us.”

Bodger explained that some hybrid varieties will never “be true” when grown from seeds. Hybrid plants produced after years of careful breeding just won't produce uniform plants from their seeds.

So the company provides uniform hybrids for planting by propagating them in tissue culture laboratories and selling what are called “unrooted cuttings,” young plants grown in the company's facility in Chile and exported to the United States and elsewhere.

But Bodger Seeds does continually search for new varieties in response to customer demand. In fact, this year, the company is introducing 24 new seed lines and 22 new botanical lines.

Bodger said some of the popular new lines are the gerbera Spinner series and such plants as agastache and anigozanthos, which are drought-tolerant and come in interesting colors.

Also popular are foliage plants derived from the sweet potato family that offer different colors of foliage, from green to bronze and speckled.

April 22, 2007