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Alumni Gallery
All Her World's a Stage
Projected Growth
by Cecilia Chan
Albert Stehly studied to be an accountant, but the would-
be bean counter never Expectedthat oranges, lemons, grapefruits
and avocados would someday become the fruits of his labors.
"I firmly believe in the jack of all trades, master
of none philosophy," says Stehly, a 1978 business graduate
who owns an 80-acre avocado and orange farm in Valley Center,
Calif. "I've learned farming by doing it, reading and
sharing information, and I've made every mistake there is
at least once."
Still,
he must be doing something right. Stehly is not only a farmer,
but also a land steward and an astute financial manager. He
and his wife, Lisa, operate a full-service grove management
and pest control business. They oversee 500 acres of avocado
and citrus groves for 40 other growers in north San Diego
County, handling the fertilizing, cultivating, spraying, harvesting
- and the bookkeeping.
"It helps to have an accounting background to understand
the financial component of it," says the 47-year-old
Stehly, who says farming is big business in San Diego County,
which has 5,925 farms and is among the nation's top 20 agricultural
producers.
Although he intended to be a tax accountant, Stehly fell
into farming after college and saw a chance to bring his business
acumen to bear on rows of trees, rather than columns of figures.
"I worked for my dad to pay off some of my debt after
going to USD," says Stehly, who eventually bought out
his father's share of the grove management business. "It
was supposed to be short term, but it turned into long term."
Stehly says farming today is highly technical, but still
unpredictable. He often sends soil samples to labs for nutrient
analysis, he employs an entomologist to look out for pests,
and he currently is getting up to speed on genetic engineering.
Despite these efforts, his crop is at the mercy of market
prices, weather, pests and rising water costs. But he has
no regrets about staying in the business.
"It's a desirable thing to do," he says, pointing
to the bright sunshine. "There are benefits to being
self-employed, and I see more people getting into it here."
Unlike the rest of the nation, where the trend is away from
small farms, Stehly says an increasing number of people in
San Diego County choose farming as a second career. Behind
the romantic notions of cultivating the land, however, he
points out that the unexpected can make the job a volatile
proposition. These days, his hands are full as the county
wrestles with a Mexican fruit fly quarantine that covers more
than 100 square miles and threatens an estimated $75 million
in crops. Of the more than 50 host plants, citrus and avocados
are the most susceptible to the female flies, which lay eggs
inside the fruits and render them inedible.
"It affects everything we do," says Stehly, past
president of the San Diego County Farm Bureau and the organization's
2002 Farmer of the Year. "We can't pick our fruit until
the quarantine is over."
Stehly says acreage belonging to 15 of his client growers,
and all of his 80 acres, are at the center of the infestation
and at the core of the quarantine. Official word is that the
quarantine, imposed in December 2002, will end in September,
but Stehly says it could continue into 2004, because more
flies are being found.
"It's pretty devastating," he says. "Will
it bankrupt us? No. But we
sure don't want it to happen two years in a row."
If he is not allowed to harvest his crop, Stehly says he's
looking at a worst-case scenario of losing 800,000 to 900,000
pounds of avocados valued at $800,000. But for now, he intends
to ride out the crisis and hope the situation turns around.
"Every day is different, every crop season is different,"
he says. "It's always exciting. If it ceases to challenge
me, then I would change."
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