UC Blog
What is sustainable agriculture?
Like other famously difficult to define terms, capturing the meaning of "sustainable agriculture" often comes down to just knowing it when you see it. Even though, the California Farm Bureau Federation took another shot at figuring out just how to define what is an increasingly appealing agricultural concept, according to an article in the today's issue of AgAlert.
According to the story, delegates at the Farm Bureau's annual meeting discussed the meaning of sustainable agriculture. Here are some of their thoughts:
- "Sustainability is a new term for things we in agriculture have been doing forever." - San Joaquin County winegrape grower Brad Goehring
- "From a farmer's point of view, economics is most important because if you are not economically sustainable, you can't do anything at all." - Lodi winegrape grower Bruce Fry
- "We have evolved toward a point in time where people are recognizing that you can't do things that are 'better for the planet' if firms are not economically viable in doing so, but the broader impacts also are increasingly being considered." - UC Davis Cooperative Extension agricultural economist Roberta Cook
- "All of the mainstream market leaders have sustainability programs from Wal-Mart, PepsiCo, Coca-Cola, McDonalds, Starbucks, Red Lobster and Sysco. This is about Wall Street as much as Main Street." - Jeff Dlott, president of SureHarvest, a company that creates sustainability tools and professional services (And formerly a UC Berkeley biological control scientist)
- "Sustainability does resonate and it is going to be a huge thing in the marketplace going forward." - Aaron Lange of Lange Twins Winery in San Joaquin County
Early career award goes to UC scientist
Congratulations to Valerie Eviner, assistant professor in the UC Davis Department of Plant Sciences. She received the 2007 Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers last Friday. Her research was funded by the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Cooperative State Research, Education, and Extension Service, according to a USDA news release
USDA nominated Eviner for her research in developing a creative method to manage rangeland and quantify its productivity. Eviner involved students, ranchers, research and extension centers, and environmental organizations to provide students with practical experience in using scientific research to answer to relevant management problems, the release said.
Commissioned by President Clinton in 1996, the Presidential Award honors and supports the achievements of young professionals at the outset of their independent research careers, according to the National Institutes of Health Web site. The Presidential Award is the highest honor bestowed by the U.S. government on outstanding scientists and engineers beginning their independent careers.
Great Christmas gift ideas
If you're out of ideas but still have names on your giving list, a Fresno Bee story reprinted this week in the Denver Post is a reminder that with good tools, you can never go wrong. For the woodworker, cook, seamstress, photographer, computer geek and backpacker, the latest top-quality tools are always appreciated. The same goes for gardeners - whether they do little more than mandatory weed clearing or strive to grow all their own food.
For the article, UC Cooperative Extension horticulture advisor Michelle LeStrange shared with reporter Nzong Ziong her personal top garden tool picks. In no particular order, she listed a Hula-ho, hand-held pruners, a shovel, gloves and a five-gallon bucket.
The reporter also spoke to a nurseryowner about his most-essential gardening tools. In addition to gloves and pruners, he suggests a bulb planter and six-inch-wide rake.
I'm with LeStrange on the Hula-ho, which is my favorite gardening tool. It is great at pulling out weeds quickly and easily, so you can leave the herbicides on the store shelves, and (a little known fact) if you turn it upside down, it works great for spreading and smoothing soil and mulch.
The Hula-ho blade.
Baby, it's cold outside
The San Joaquin Valley is bracing for a hard freeze predicted to strike tonight and tomorrow morning, putting the Valley's $1.3 billion citrus industry on high alert. Whether farmers will have to spring into action depends on a lot of things, such as cloud cover, according to Joel Nelson of California Citrus Mutual, who was quoted in today's San Francisco Chronicle.
"But we will have the wind machines primed and many of them on from 8 p.m. to 7 a.m.," Nelson is quoted.
The Bakersfield Californian turned to UC Cooperative Extension farm advisor John Karlik for advice for homeowners worried about potential freeze damage to landscape plants. He said residents within the city limits can rest fairly easy this week, but those who live in the slightly colder, outlying areas may need to take added precautions.
According to the article, he suggested homeowners bring tropical and sub-tropical plants inside, if possible, and cover outdoor plants overnight using plastic, cloth or newspapers. Watering the plants during the day will help preserve heat at night.
For more details on protecting your garden from frost, see this article by Pam Geisel, the academic coordinator for the UC Master Gardener program.
A note about the headline: The Valley, of course, is rarely as cold as New York, where Frank Loesser wrote the song "Baby, It's Cold Outside" in 1944, but the music still rings in the ears of Californians when an artic air mass descends on the state. A cute version of the song by Doris Day and Bing Crosby is one of many posted on YouTube.
A citrus tree that was coated with water for frost protection.
4-H connects members with engineering careers
Yesterday I wrote a post to this blog about a 4-H article in Mechanical Engineering, the publication of the American Society of Mechanical Engineers. Alas, I learned later that our Web Action Team was performing an upgrade to the blog system which required some database upgrades. My post was lost.
I did want to link the story again because it illustrates the breadth of 4-H programs. According to the article, the perception that 4-H programs are limited to agriculture, nutrition and citizenship is wrong. In fact, in the 1940s, 4-H programs in electrical engineering brought awareness of circuitry and control systems to youth in rural communities.
Director and 4-H advisor for Merced County UC Cooperative Extension Richard Mahacek has fond memories of his own participation in scientific 4-H projects in the 1960s.
“What I really got out of 4-H was a better understanding about electricity by participating in electrical projects," Mahacek was quoted in the story. "We made toy buzzers and electromagnets. It was an opportunity to internalize and understand electricity, not from a textbook, but from hands-on activities that brought those concepts to life.”
The 4-H activities that Mahacek now oversees are some of the five million 4-H science, engineering, and technology projects being offered in communities across America. Because of its reach and existing science, engineering and technology curricula, 4-H considers itself well positioned to help promote science education in urban, suburban and rural settings, the story says.
Merced 4-H member learns by doing.