Pollen Season Brings Misery on the Wind : Environment: Recent rains have left a bumper crop of allergens. And that means an unusually bad year for hay fever sufferers.

Linda Owens can tell it’s going to be a bad spring. In the past few weeks, the Ventura woman’s chronic hay fever has blossomed into the most severe symptoms she has had in years. Her nose is always stuffy. She wakes up with pounding headaches. And red eyes make her look older than her 42 years, she says.

“It’s worse this year,” Owens said dolefully as she sat in her doctor’s office in Ventura recently. “I wake up in the morning and my eyes are completely purple. It’s terrible. It’s absolutely terrible.”

Thousands of Ventura County residents would agree, doctors say. The county is experiencing one of the worst hay fever and asthma seasons in recent memory, allergy doctors and agricultural experts say, thanks to rapid plant growth since the recent heavy rains.

“Everything is in full gear,” said Ben Faber, a farm adviser with the University of California Cooperative Extension office in Ventura. “As long as we have rainfall, the pollen count is going to skyrocket.”

Trees that haven’t blossomed in years are responding to the rain with more blooms than ever, Faber said. Some of the worst culprits are oak, walnut and sycamore trees.

Damp weather has also encouraged the growth of molds, which release spores that can trigger allergic reactions. And the worst is yet to come, physicians say.

The heaviest pollination period for trees comes between March and May. Hillsides that were once brown throughout the spring will be sprouting with wild oats and rye grasses, which produce pollen grains that become airborne in the wind. By late summer, unplanted fields will be fertile ground for ragweed, tumbleweed and sagebrush, Faber said.

The tiny wind-blown pollen grains from these plants irritate the nose and throat of allergy sufferers, who number about 20% of the population, physicians say.

Allergy specialists report gains in new patients of 10% to 30% in the past few weeks. Dr. Donald Unger, whose allergy practice is in Thousand Oaks, said he has seen a 28% increase in new patients during the last three months compared to the same period last year.

Their complaints?

“Sneezing. Runny noses. Stuffy heads. Itchy eyes. Watery eyes,” Unger said. “My guess is there’s twice as much tree pollen and two to three times as much molds.”

Camarillo allergist Dr. Lewis Kanter said he has seen a 10% increase in new patients at his office compared to the same period last year.

“It’s coming earlier than last year also,” Kanter said. “This started the first of March, and normally it would start the first of April. These are the strongest early allergies we’ve had in the last five years.”

No recent pollen counts have been conducted in Ventura County, doctors said. But in Santa Barbara County, which has a similar climate and agriculture, officials at the Santa Barbara Medical Foundation Clinic confirmed the Ventura County doctors’ assessment.

For several weeks, the number of pollen grains in the air has shown a marked increase compared to past years, said Zeb Dyer, a physician’s assistant in charge of pollen counting at the Santa Barbara clinic.

In March, Dyer said, the pollen count was measured at 885 grains per cubic meter. The highest count last year was about 425 grains per cubic meter, recorded in February, he said.

“The oak pollen was very high” in the recent count, Dyer said. “It’s about four times as high as the highest one I got last year.”

Early this month, Dyer measured 196 grains per cubic meter. The pollen count dropped, he said, because some of the trees have stopped pollinating and grasses had not yet begun producing pollen. With the warmer weather, which stimulates pollen production, the amount of airborne pollen will increase again, he said, but this time it will be grass pollen and its effect is even worse.

Ventura allergist Dr. James Villaveces said most of his new patients can tell how high the pollen count is just by how runny and red their noses are.

“This is a tough year,” Villaveces said. “The people come in with multiple symptoms. I had a lady falling over from dizziness. All the little kids’ asthma have flared up.”

In many cases, the doctors said they simply recommend over-the-counter medications, such as antihistamines, decongestants and nose sprays, although sprays should be used with the close supervision of a doctor.

In more severe cases of asthma and hay fever, sufferers should see a doctor to determine what pollens cause their allergies.

Some patients who have extreme allergic reactions may also get periodic shots. They are injected with a solution that stimulates antibodies that lessen their reactions.

Tina Cook of Santa Paula said pollen from the orange tree outside her home made her life so miserable that she decided to start getting shots.

Villaveces, a past president of the Gold Coast Allergy Society, conducted a pollen study 16 years ago that identified about 60 allergy-causing pollens around the county.

The conversion of agricultural land to residential and commercial neighborhoods has not lessened the pollen problem, Villaveces said. Ornamental trees in suburban gardens, from acacias to willows, are just as likely to cause allergic reactions. Most domestic lawns are planted with Bermuda grass and bluegrass, also big pollen producers.

Villaveces said coastal residents in Oxnard, Ventura and Port Hueneme may benefit from offshore winds that sometimes sweep pollens out to sea.

“In Ojai, it doesn’t go anywhere, it just builds up,” he said. “Simi Valley’s another tough place. The smog and the pollen seem to go together. It irritates the lungs and nose.”

The easiest way to minimize the problem, Kanter said, is to stay indoors.

“There’s limited amount of pollen indoors,” he said. “It keeps (symptoms) down to a dull roar.”

Tips for Allergy Sufferers

* Stay inside early mornings and afternoons, when pollen and mold spores are most prevalent.

* Close windows and use an air conditioner or air filter to keep out pollens.

* Use a dehumidifier. Indoor molds thrive in high humidity.

* Avoid yard work, or wear a mask.

* Avoid vacuuming, which stirs dust.

* Landscape with plants that produce little or no pollen. The American Lung Assn. has a guide.

Source: American Lung Assn. of Ventura County