State agriculture inspectors are stepping up their efforts to battle what they believe is an agricultural time bomb.
After discovering what's known as the Asian citrus psyllid in the Hillcrest neighborhood of San Diego last week, the farthest north the bug has been found in the city, agriculture officials warned that the bug was rapidly moving north since crossing the Mexican border at Tijuana in July.
The pest is responsible for spreading citrus greening disease and causing catastrophic damage to orange farms in Florida and Brazil. Agricultural officials warn that the same disease could be a catastrophe for California's $1.2-billion citrus industry.
To slow the pest's advance, officials have established quarantines in parts of San Diego and Imperial counties, prohibiting the movement of citrus plant material out of those areas. Fruit can still be shipped, but it has to be cleaned first.
For now, officials believe the state's orange groves are still free of the disease. The danger is that the psyllid, a durable insect that can withstand freezing temperatures and hurricane-force winds, will find trees infected with greening and spread it across the state.
"We have never been threatened with a disease like this before," said John Gless, a third-generation farmer from Riverside who wonders whether there will be anything left of his 6,000 acres of California citrus groves to pass on to his children and grandchildren who farm with him.
Southern California residents are unknowingly the first line of defense, because only their vigilance can provide the early warning agriculture officials need to save the industry, said Ted Batkin, president of the Citrus Research Board.
The psyllid alone won't hurt California orange groves. The threat comes when the bug lands on a tree already infected with the bacterium that causes the greening disease, also known as huanglongbing or yellow dragon disease. It will feed on the diseased tree and then carry the pathogen to nearby trees. The psyllid will reproduce -- like aphids, they are asexual and don't need to find a mate -- creating whole colonies of citrus greening carriers.
State and local inspectors are tracking the bug, hoping that it doesn't find a citrus tree already infected with the disease, which has no cure.
Experts are almost certain one or more infected trees are out there, probably innocently spirited past airport or U.S. Customs security into Southern California by an orange- or grapefruit-loving visitor from Asia, Florida or some other locale.
