Washington ? Hard hit by four hurricanes, Florida citrus growers will produce 27 percent fewer oranges in the 2004 to 2005 season — the smallest crop in 11 years, the Agriculture Department said Tuesday.

Florida’s grapefruit was particularly damaged by the hurricanes, producing the smallest crop since the 1937-38 season, department officials said. Production is expected to be 15 million 85-pound boxes — or 63 percent less than last season’s nearly 41 million boxes. Nationally, production would fall to 26 million boxes, about half of last year’s 50 million.

“Grapefruit was hit bad,” said Bob Terry, the department’s chief of statistics in Florida, who attributed most of the damage to the citrus crop to high winds. “When winds get up over 50 to 60 miles an hour, it blows the fruit off.”

The damage was felt most in two counties, Indian River and St. Lucie, which produce two-thirds of the state’s grapefruit crop.

The losses to Florida’s $800 million citrus crop — which accounts for three-quarters of the nation’s citrus products — will reduce production by the nation’s biggest orange grower to production of 176 million 90-pound boxes, the department said in its first forecast of the hurricane damage.

That is down from 242 million boxes last season, the second highest on record.

The biggest season was 1997’s 244 million boxes. The expected crop of oranges this season is the least since 1993, when 174 million boxes were produced.

The government attributed the expected losses — an estimate based on actual fruit counts and measurements by Florida agriculture officials — directly to damage from hurricanes Charley, Frances, Ivan and Jeanne in citrus-producing areas of the state.

Nationally, 240 million boxes of oranges are expected to be produced this year, the department said. That includes 62,000 from Florida, 1,900 from Texas and 440 from Arizona. Boxes in California and Arizona are 75 pounds; those in Texas are 85 pounds.

Brian Burns is the owner of a 242-acre orange grove in Arcadia, Fla., that was severely damaged by Hurricane Charley. Burns took a close look at his damaged Hamlin oranges on Aug. 16. Hard hit by four hurricanes, Florida citrus growers will produce 27 percent fewer oranges this season -- the smallest crop in 11 years.

The prices that growers earn for their fruit are expected to rise because of the decreased orange and grapefruit crops, as are the cost of futures contracts for frozen orange juice concentrate.

But the price that shoppers pay for juice at the store is expected to remain fairly stable because processors still hold a big inventory of oranges from last year’s huge crop.