Feb. 4, 2010 - Spinach is helping build a strong economy in the Winter Garden region of Texas, southwest of San Antonio. The area was the primary spinach producer in the country and still produces a fair amount.
Though the state doesn't own the market share of spinach that it once did, the Winter Garden region of Texas still grows vegetables on about 44,000 to 55,000 acres in a four county area. The heart of the region is Uvalde, Medina, Frio and Zavalla Counties, but Joe Pena, a Texas AgriLife economist based in Uvalde, said an area that includes Atascosa down to Maverick County and farther south, has to be included as part of the region.
"You wouldn't necessarily know that you were in that region if you were driving through, but from the air you can see it as a big, beautiful valley," Pena said. "The area where vegetables are grown is looser than it used to be."
Spinach is still grown on approximately 3,000 acres in Southwest Texas. Though that is a significant amount, it's a far cry from what it was 20 years ago, Pena noted.
"If you ate spinach in 1987 or 1988, it came from this area," he said. "We harvested nine months a year. Now we harvest three or four months a year. If you buy spinach now, this time of year, there's a 50 percent chance it came from Texas."
Several states, including California, have a region that is called a Winter Garden because of a mild climate and access to water for irrigation. The Texas Winter Garden region was, before the advent of irrigation, a dry area comprised mostly of short grasses and mesquite thickets. Irrigation and the arrival of the railroad in the early 1900s transformed the region into a thriving agricultural area.
The first documented shipment of Texas spinach was in 1918, the same year it is believed that large scale planting commenced. The state's reputation for high-quality spinach was based on the savoy or semi-savoy varieties, rather than the smooth leaf types grown in other spinach-producing regions.
Texas produced about 40 percent of the country's spinach in the mid-1980s, but that number has dropped to about 9 percent, Pena said, adding that most of the spinach produced in the state today is processed for canning and freezing. California dominates spinach production with Texas second in processed spinach and third, behind California and Arizona, in fresh market spinach.
"California stepped in with bagged baby spinach varieties that became very popular," Pena said. "They produced these bags with holes that 'breathe' and keep the spinach fresh. That's what dominates the market today."
The Texas Winter Garden region has between 44,000 and 55,000 acres devoted to growing fruit and vegetables including potatoes, cabbages, cucumbers, carrots, watermelons, cantaloupes, onions and green beans. Pena said that it's hard to say which crop is dominant, because that can change from year to year, depending on markets and availability.
"One of the more recent crops we've started growing is sweet corn," he said. "We had not been able to do sweet corn because of problems with worms. People don't like finding worms in their corn, but we have some new varieties that take care of that problem. Plus, growers are careful to segregate the corn to make sure that any ears that do have worms don't get shipped."
Larry Stein, an AgriLife Extension horticulturist based in Uvalde, said the region produces crops year-round. Field corn, sorghum and cotton are among the main row crops produced in the area. There are also a large number of livestock producers, including goats, both Angora and meat, along with sheep and livestock.
Stein said farmers and ranchers still depend on access to water, but disputes concerning water allocations have clouded the issue and will be a challenge for agriculture producers in the area.
"Water in the Winter Garden region is still but pretty cheap, but San Antonio is trying to change that," he said. "That's going to be a big challenge. The other challenges are heat, wind, insects -- the weather in general."
Pena said the most recent weather challenge -- temperatures that dropped into the teens and lower in some parts of the region -- did not hurt growers too much.
"Because it got cold slowly and the actual cold days weren't that long, the damage turned out, as far as we can tell now, not that bad. Some of the trees on the small orchards look a little funky but it will take some time to see how much actual damage was done. The spinach and cabbage had some burned tips but otherwise look okay."
