Blogs: Agriculture and Natural Resource

Mark Bolda's Berry Blog

The Use of Esteem, Oberon and Prevam for the Control of Greenhouse Whitefly in Strawberries
Posted 10/11/2018 - A couple of months ago, I had a meaningful conversation with my colleague Gerald Holmes at the CalPoly Strawberry Institute concerning extension of our research results.  It dawned on me that over time I have accumulated quite a bit of information...

Extension Meeting: Management of Gophers and Groundsquirrels
Posted 10/8/2018 - To be held at our office at 1430 Freedom Blvd, Suite E in Watsonville on October 24.  Sign in starts at 730 am and the meeting goes to noon. Get here early, looks to be a pretty heavily subscribed event.  Agenda below.

Article: What it Takes to Successfully Introduce Mechanization of Harvest into a Cropping System
Posted 9/7/2018 - The following is an article from a California Agriculture magazine published in the year 2000, and in using two case studies from California, is quite instructive on what it takes to successfully introduce mechanization and automation into a cropping...

Redberry Mite in Primocane Blackberries?
Posted 9/6/2018 - No, I don't think so and see for yourself with the photo series below.  I have quite a few more of these pictures, but I think you'll get the point with the two series posted. I've been getting a host of questions concerning what appears to be...

Is There a Botanist in the House?
Posted 9/2/2018 - A recent page one article in a major American newspaper lamented the declining number of skilled botanists in the US. Something about animals being more interesting, with the net result that we are left with very few people who can distinguish between...

Livestock and Range Update Blogs

Tools for Conserving Working Lands: Easements, Mitigation, and Other Strategies
Here's a message from the Pajaro Compass about their upcoming meeting. WHEN:Wednesday, October 24th, 8:30 am – noon WHERE: Veterans Memorial Building, Room 218, 649 San Benito Street, Hollister RSVP: Please follow the link HERE to RSVP, or...

Sheep Production 101 Workshop at UC Davis, October 13
Please join California Wool Growers Association for a Sheep Production 101 Workshop at the University of California Davis. This workshop will focus on sheep production basics, animal handling, breeding practices, nutrition, lambing, and predator...

What do you want to know about oaks?
A few Livestock Advisors in Central California are interested in developing a research project on oaks and we want to make sure the project will be valuable to you! I'm hoping you will be willing to take 3 minutes to fill out a survey about why oaks are...

AB 589 Water Diversion Monitoring and Reporting Training - King City, October 24
Join us on October 24 at the Orradre Building at the Salinas Valley Fairgrounds in King City from 8:30 am to 12:00 pm to learn what you need to know to comply with Senate Bill 88.  Cost is $25/person.  Register here: https://bit.ly/2CMH30n or...

New Central Coast Cow/Calf Cost Study Available
Are you a rancher who is interested in figuring out ways to reduce costs? Are you thinking about going into the cattle business? Or are you a staff person at an agency that uses livestock grazing as a land management tool, and want to better...

Salinas Valley Agriculture

Celery Irrigation Trial Field Day
Posted 9/30/2018 - USDA-ARS Spence Research farm 1572 Old Stage Rd. (36.628792, -121.540791) Thursday October 18th, 9 am to 10:30 am   UC Cooperative Extension will host a field day at the USDA-ARS Spence research farm to show a field trial evaluating water use...

Dealing with Diamondback Moth
Posted 8/25/2018 - It has been a couple of “rough” weeks managing the diamondback moth (DBM), Plutella xylostella (Lepidoptera: Plutellidae), in the Central Coast. Based on my conversations with some PCAs, we are managing large populations of this moth,...

National Honey Bee Day 2018: Brush up on your knowledge of bee protection
Posted 8/16/2018 - Celebrate National Honey Bee Day by brushing up on your knowledge of bee protection—check out the newly revised Best Management Practices to Protect Bees from Pesticides and Bee Precaution Pesticide Ratings from UC IPM. These resources will...

Got "red" aphids?
Posted 8/3/2018 - Since last week, I have been receiving samples with “red” aphids to get the identification. It turned out that this time, most of these ‘reddish' aphids were identified as the lettuce aphid, Nasonovia ribis-nigri (Fig. 1). To me, they...

Bagrada bug update
Posted 6/25/2018 - We have been scouting for Bagrada bug on wild host plants at two sites in the San Ardo area since middle of May. We selected San Ardo as our most southern scouting point for the Salinas Valley. Every other week, we have performed plant visual counts and...

Small Farm News

Exploring Bay Area Wholesale Market Options
Posted 6/26/2017 - On June 13, the Small Farm Program partnered with UCCE Small Farm Advisor Margaret Lloyd to conduct a tour of wholesale produce markets for Sacramento region farmers. During the bus ride from Woodland to San Francisco, I described the packaging and...

Ag labor management seminars offer keys to success in times of labor uncertainty
Posted 1/17/2017 - UC Cooperative Extension will hold workshops in Temecula Feb. 1 and 2 to help California agricultural employers facing many challenges including labor shortages, wage & hour laws, joint liability, worker safety, workers comp insurance, and...

USDA Announces Streamlined Guaranteed Loans and Additional Lender Category for Small-Scale Operators
Posted 11/17/2016 - USDA recently announced the availability of a streamlined version of USDA guaranteed loans, which are tailored for smaller scale farms and urban producers. The program, called EZ Guarantee Loans, uses a simplified application process to help beginning,...

Economic Impact of Local Food Marketing in the Sacramento Region
Posted 7/14/2016 - Consumers often say that they buy locally produced foods because they want to support their local economy. Our newly released report confirms that buying locally produced foods does support the local economy. Our University of California Cooperative...

UC Small Farm Advisor works with grower to push the "Horticultural Envelope"
Posted 11/10/2015 - This article by Matt Kettman was published in the Santa Barbara Independent on October 6, 2015.  UC Small Farm Advisor, Mark Gaskell, has been providing technical assistance to small-scale growers in Santa Barbara and San Luis Obispo counties for...

Bug Squad

A Case of Mistaken Identity
Posted 10/22/2018 - They can't drain your bank account. They can't open up new credit cards. They can't get medical treatment on your health insurance. But they are identity thieves, nonetheless. Meet the drone fly (Eristalis tenax), often mistaken for a honey...

What This Scientist Discovered in an Insect and Why It Matters
Posted 10/19/2018 - What this scientist discovered in an insect and why it matters... Naoki Yamanaka, an assistant professor at UC Riverside (UCR), is known for his innovative and creative research. In fact, the National Institute of Health (NIH) just awarded him a $2.4...

Pollinators on the Beach? Fancy Meeting You Here
Posted 10/18/2018 - So you're walking along Doran Regional Park Beach in Sonoma County on Tuesday, Oct. 16 and thinking about the pollinators in your back yard. (Don't we all?) And then: what a delight to see. Apis mellifera (honey bees) and Eristalis tenax,...

Hungry, Hungry Caterpillars!
Posted 10/17/2018 - It starts out slow. Beginning in the spring (and sometimes year-around in some locales) Gulf Fritillaries (Agraulis vanillae) lay their eggs on their host plant, the passionflower vine (Passiflora). They deposit their eggs on the tendrils, on the...

They Don't Announce Their Arrival or Departure
Posted 10/16/2018 - They don't announce their arrival or departure. If you're an insect photographer, or a wanna-be-insect photographer, expect the unexpected and don't go anywhere without your camera. That applies to such simple things as walking out your back door and...

Food Blog

Honey bee health key to wellbeing of important species
Posted 10/18/2018 - Our friends the honey bees make it possible for us to devour an abundance of almond products. In 2016 the California almond crop totaled 2.15 billion pounds valued at $5.2 billion. Growing 80 percent of the world's almonds in California takes a lot of...

It’s electric?! Breaking down electric pressure cookers
Posted 10/17/2018 - You may have heard the buzz about electric pressure cookers. Even if you don't follow kitchen trends, this piece of equipment may take some of the "pressure off" of preparing meals. From personal experience, I can say that they're also quite...

Two UC graduate students chosen to assist UC ANR Global Food Initiative efforts
Posted 10/11/2018 - Two University of California graduate students have been selected by UC Agriculture and Natural Resources as UC Global Food Initiative (GFI) fellows for 2018-19. Graduate students Melanie Colvin at UC Berkeley and Maci Mueller at UC Davis will work with...

Tips to prepare, plant, and grow a fall vegetable garden
Posted 9/14/2018 - The transition of fall is upon us and gardeners are busy tending to late summer harvests, pruning back perennials, prepping for slower plant growth and more. But fall doesn't have to be all about wrapping up the growing season. In fact, life is sprouting...

Let them eat cherries: Planning a U-Pick operation on your farm
Posted 8/29/2018 - Farmers work long hours under the open sky, struggling to finish each day's planting, cultivating, pruning or picking before the sun sets. It's hard sometimes to imagine, while engaged in this day-to-day pressure, but city people often welcome the chance...

Blog de Alimentos

Consejos para preparar, plantar y cultivar un huerto otoñal
Posted 9/14/2018 - In English La transición hacia el otoño está a la vuelta de la esquina y los jardineros están ocupados atendiendo sus cosechas de fin del verano, podando las plantas perennes, preparándose para las plantas de...

¡Deja que se coman las cerezas! Si planeas una operación de auto recolección de frutas en tu granja
Posted 9/5/2018 - Los granjeros trabajan largas horas al aire libre, luchando por terminar cada día la plantación, el cultivo, la poda o la recolección antes que el sol se oculte. Es difícil algunas veces imaginarse, mientras están...

Por qué AA quiere decir adicto al aguacate
Posted 8/15/2018 - In English Si tú eres como la mayoría de nosotros, te “vuelves loco” por un plátano para el desayuno. Es saludable, nutritivo y lleno de potasio. ¡Pero espera! Deberías volverte loco por otra fruta, ese...

Los granjeros del sureste asiático del área de Fresno cultivan un “súper alimento”
Posted 7/9/2018 - In English Durante treinta años, el granjero Vang Thao ha admministrado exitosamente una granja localizada al sur de Fresno, en la que produce una gama espectacular de verduras – tomates heirloom, pimientos púrpura, espinacas de agua...

Alimentación escolar: respaldando la salud de los niños y el sistema alimentario local
Posted 6/25/2018 - In English El servicio de alimentos escolares representa una industria multimillonaria que tiene un impacto en las vidas de más de 30 millones de estudiantes (en su mayoría) de bajos recursos. Esta industria provee dos terceras partes de...

Forest Research and Outreach

Bring the wild back into our farmlands to protect biodiversity, researchers say
Posted 10/22/2018 - Reposted from the UCANR News Berkeley — With a body the size of a fist and wings that span more than a foot, the big brown bat must gorge on 6,000 to 8,000 bugs a night to maintain its stature. This mighty appetite can be a boon to...

Dry conditions keep sudden oak death in check, yet significant outbreaks continue
Posted 10/9/2018 - Reposted from the UCANR Green Blog       Sudden oak death, which has killed millions of trees in California over the past 20 years, is spreading more slowly, according to California's most recent citizen-science sudden...

Clean Water Act dramatically cut pollution in U.S. waterways
Posted 10/9/2018 - Reposted from the UC Berkeley News The 1972 Clean Water Act has driven significant improvements in U.S. water quality, according to the first comprehensive study of water pollution over the past several decades, by researchers at UC Berkeley and Iowa...

High-Risk Housing Developments Fan the Flames for Wildfire
Posted 9/6/2018 - Reposted from California Magazine   The world certainly seems more flammable these days. Thousands of homes were lost last year in Sonoma County alone, and wildfires have raged across California all summer. And not just in...

‘He brought us all together’: UC Berkeley professor, forestry economist Peter Berck dies at 68
Posted 8/26/2018 - Reposted from The Daily Californian Peter Berck, one of the world's foremost forestry economists and a professor in UC Berkeley's Department of Agricultural and Resource Economics, or ARE, died of cancer Aug. 10 at age 68. Berck earned a...

Oak Conservation

Proceedings Available - 7th California Oak Symposium: Managing Oak Woodlands in a Dynamic World
Posted 12/10/2015 - Overview: Beginning in 1979, there have been a series of symposia held every 5 to 7 years addressing the state of our knowledge about science, policy and management factors affecting California's oak resource. This program, held November 3-6, 2014 in...

Irrigating Oaks in the Drought
Posted 7/15/2015 - To water or not to water….an oak. That's the question. If only Shakespeare could answer our questions as eloquently as in his plays. In a state where the motto has become “brown is the new green” as people allow irrigated lawns to...

Call for Papers: 7th California Oak Symposium - Nov. 3-6, 2014 - Visalia, CA California
Posted 2/14/2014 - The 7th California Oak Symposium: Managing Oak Woodlands in a Dynamic California, will be held November 3-6, 2014 in Visalia, California. Complete details on the Symposium can be viewed on the website.  We are requesting abstracts for oral...

7th California Oak Symposium: Nov. 3-6, 2014 - Visalia, CA
Posted 1/8/2014 - General Overview Beginning in 1979, there have been a series of symposia held every 5 to 7 years addressing the state of our knowledge about science, policy and management factors affecting California’s oak resource. This upcoming program...

Oaks in the Urban Landscape - October 10
Posted 9/16/2013 -   Oaks in the Urban Landscape: Selection, Care, and Preservation is the most current and comprehensive handbook available for the management of oak trees. Join authors Larry Costello, Bruce Hagen and Katherine Jones, along with UC...