Living amongst big ag? (florida citrus)

Hi all. I made a post a bit back about achieving gerthood. I am in south florida (zone 10b, bordering 11a). Land in my area is very expensive. Windstorm insurance for hurricanes is also very expensive. In my thread on achieving gerthood, I came to the conclusion that central florida in a good microclimate that gives me a 10a-ish growing zone could be a good option. Yet, that area is citrus country. I'm sure many people here might have experience living amongst big ag. What do I need to keep in mind? I'd like a large enough lot where I can put up windbreaks to prevent sprays from coming onto my property. I would definitely want to test the groundwater for chemicals. Anything else I would need to consider?>

I have never lived among big ag, so I guess I may be very fortunate in that respect.  

When we bought our homestead we were looking for something to get out of the big city.  We bought 10 acres that backed up to other 10-acre plots.

Our next property after we sold the homestead was bought in a lakeside community.

Then we decided to live near our daughter and found a smaller plot surrounding 100 unused acres and landlocked.

Now we live in the middle of nowhere.  The only commodity is deer.

When I lived in Florida, we were amazed that the grocery store did not sell oranges.  We asked and they said to ask next door that those folks had an orchard and would sell us some.

there is a wonderful story of a town in Italy they fought Big Ag from buying up small farms and converting them to Big Ag.
The main issue was chemical sprays over their farms which were 100's of years old and clean.
In the end the villagers won.
If I had any concerns as you appear to have I would not live there, you never know what is being sprayed nor when and nobody will listen to you.
Over spray may drift  MILE, AND grow water may well be polluted now if not in the future.
Rainfall catchment would be silly and ponds may be dead from chemicals. Its all happened before.

I would look for something downwind from some kind of preserved natural area, ie park, state forest, wetland preserve, etc.

Learn what typical spray regimens are for citrus. As far as chemicals go, I've been told by a university citrus grower that they don't do much at all.

Look into Driftwatch and register if you are interested and able.

Be neighborly. Get to know your neighbors. We're surrounded by corn/soybeans but our neighbor farming by us has demanded to split the cost of surveys and livestock perimeter fencing. We have little in common but get along well.

Buffer strips can provide habitat and protect your crops; unfortunately it's your responsibility to build those in, not theirs. Windbreaks are the same but slower growing.

Call the water testing lab and ask them what and when to test. I've found ours to be happy to chat about what they know.

https://driftwatch.org/
Is an amazing site for the information about where anything is grown or bred.
Bees, fish farms and crops.
Even herbs.

The comments on this thread are incredible. Thank you all so much. I deal with eye strain and had a lot of grading to do with the end of the semester, so couldn't follow up on this thread earlier as I would have liked to. I will use the referenced resources and ideas and see what happens. When I look on a map, there does seem to be a few pockets of unmolested central florida land in what appears to be a likely good microclimate (based on proximity to a southeast side of a lakes), so I'll explore those areas further and avoid the bigag stuff for now.

Idk what gerthood is, but I'm visiting with relatives in Central Florida rural just south of Ocala national Forest. It is a nice area. We are also looking to find suitable homestead land / home here. The mountains are too cold and cloudy for our liking now that were getting older. We just visited Alexander springs nearby and it is a beautiful clearwater spring and beach.

The other issue I'd be wary of would depend on what you plan to grow yourself. If you want to grow oranges, local farmers may accuse your trees of being a reservoir of bad bugs and try to force you to spray. It will be important to have literature back-up suggesting that you are supporting your trees naturally so that you have predators to control bugs etc.

So far as wind direction, remember to consider typical winds based on the time of year Big Ag is likely to spray. Our winds shift depending on the season.

Citrus greening disease is really bad here. I used to have a mental map of dozens of local citrus trees that have all since died as did my own trees. I've considered doing Key Limes as a micro green since the leaves have a lime taste to them unlike most other varieties, but beyond that I wouldn't spend another penny trying to grow citrus outdoors here.

There are a lot of blueberry farms in the area outside of Ocala National Forest, and certain other things grow quite easily in the summer like watermelon and sweet potato. David the Good has tons of YouTube videos (over 1,400!), as well as books about growing in Florida. Pete Kanaris is another YouTuber with awesome Florida specific focus. There are lots of things considered typical in other places that will lead to disaster if you attempt them here, so it's pretty amazing we have a wealth of knowledge available to us with our unique mixture of land and weather.

I'm very much of the opinion that it's better to try things out and go with what works, especially when starting out. If you try doing a northern style garden here in the summer it probably won't survive the brutal August sun. The same style garden does much better in the 'winter' or dry season as some call it. I call it the 'slightly less wet season' given my experience over the past several years now. If you approach it with the notion that you want to grow specific things without prior experience growing them here, you're likely going to have a rough time. It's very easy to fall in the trap of, "everyone says this is simple" followed by lots of struggling and failure to yield. Much like the idea Florida = citrus. Many years back I remember hearing news about how the state lost 10 billion dollars of citrus in only one quarter. I can't even fathom how many trees that is, or how much toxic gick was sprayed trying to slow that down.