"That makes it two bucks for an empty box of cabbage," says Mr. Schmitt, who, with his wife and son, works a 160-acre farm off Sound Avenue in Riverhead. Spinach, lettuce, sweet corn and cabbage are their biggest crops. The wax on the boxes, he explained, is petroleum-based. "Boxes have probably gone up 60 to 70 percent in the last three years," he says.

Jeff Rottkamp, who has a 200-acre farm in Calverton, says the price of fertilizer has more than tripled over the past three years and more than doubled this year alone. "There's fertilizer that used to be $200 to $250 a ton two or three years ago. Now it's $900," he says. Even the price of the plastic tarps, or plastic mulch, the Rottkamps use to protect and heat their crops early in the planting season has more than doubled, he says.

Michael Lee, the son of Fred and Karin Lee of Sang Lee Farms, an organic farm in Peconic, says everything made of plastic or resin has gone skyward. Four-inch pots in which to plant herbs, a Sang Lee specialty, used to cost three cents apiece but now cost nine cents. "That can really add up when you do as many potted herbs as we do," he says.

Organic fertilizers, such as chicken manure and peanut meal, have always cost a little more than chemical fertilizers, he says. But now, organic fertilizer has gone through the roof. Plus, he says, truckers are charging a fuel surtax to bring in supplies. The surcharge, he says, can be as high as $100 a load.

For all local farmers, the real killer has been the sharp rise in the cost of diesel fuel. Historically, diesel has cost less per gallon than gasoline. And even a year ago, it was selling for roughly the same as gas. But a service station in Calverton last week was posting the price of diesel at $5.19 a gallon.

Al Krupski, a Peconic farmer and Southold Town councilman, says the high cost of diesel has impacted almost everything he does -- not what it costs just to run his tractors but also to operate his irrigation systems, whose pumps also run on diesel. He says the price of seeds also has escalated.

Experts blame the high cost of diesel on a number of factors, including new federal standards to reduce the fuel's sulfur content, which have added significantly to refinery costs. Another factor, according to the U.S Energy Department, has been the huge increase in worldwide demand for diesel, most notably from China and India, with refining capacity failing to keep pace.

In addition, the energy department says, the decline in the dollar versus the Euro has pushed up the price of imported diesel. The rising cost of transporting diesel is still another factor, giving rise to the surcharges that more and more fuel truckers are demanding.

"What we were spending on fuel last year I thought was ridiculous." Mr. Schmitt says. "But now it's scary, and you wonder how we're going to recoup that."

Says Mr. Rottkamp, "I don't think we've ever had in the history of agriculture a situation in which our costs were going up so quickly and in such a short period of time. When it's time for a farmer to sell his products, he's going to have to be very cautious or he's actually going to be losing money and not know it."

All farmers interviewed for this story agree that prices at farm stands will have to be higher than last year or they're going to go broke.

"There's no doubt about it. We will need more money for our products, and we just can't change that," Mr. Rottkamp says. But how high they can go is a matter of concern, he says,

Mr. Krupski thinks most consumers already are well-conditioned to paying higher prices for food. He says he went shopping recently with his wife, Mary, at a major supermarket. "I was amazed at what it was asking for its fruits and vegetables," he says. Since he sells all his produce at his farm stand, Mr. Krupski hopes his customers will understand, and he thinks they will.

Joe Gergela, executive director of the Long Island Farm Bureau, sees a possible silver lining to the rising cost of gasoline and diesel. He thinks that major chain stores on Long Island may begin the see the wisdom of buying locally rather than paying the high cost to truck in produce, especially to the East End.

Bethpage-based King Kullen already is buying much of its seasonal produce from Long Island farmers, and Mr. Gergela thinks that chains headquartered elsewhere may begin doing the same.

The biggest chain to entice, he says, is the giant Great Atlantic and Pacific Tea Company, based in Montvale, N.J. It not only owns A&P but also Waldbaum's, with stores throughout Suffolk County, and Pathmark, which the company acquired last year. Pathmark, too, has a large presence in the county.

Mr. Gergela said last week that Bob Nolan, the Brookhaven farmer who is president of the Long Island Farm Bureau, had recently travelled to New Jersey to meet with executives from the Great Atlantic and Pacific Tea Company. No agreements were reached, but Mr. Gergela says he remains hopeful.

"Because transportation had finally become an issue, we recognized several years ago that things might start getting better for Long Island farmers, and I think we will see that," Mr. Gergela says.

Mr. Gergela sees another benefit for North Fork farmers. "The demand is the greatest I've ever seen for locally-grown products which you can buy the day they were picked," he says.

Unfortunately, he admits, some favorable trends are developing at a time when many local farmers have already packed it in.

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