- Author: Jeannette E. Warnert
The Salinas Californian reported on a meeting in Monterey County in which UC Berkeley Cooperative Extension specialist Peggy Lemaux urged care when considering bans on genetically modified organisms.
Lemaux spoke to the Monterey County Agricultural Advisory Committee, which is deciding wether to recommend a GMO ban to the county supervisors. According to reporter Dawn Withers, Lemaux said county officials must be careful about what rules will govern the use of genetically modified organisms.
"When working with biological systems, you...
- Author: Jeannette E. Warnert
Two California newspapers ran stories over the weekend with information gleaned at the UC Cooperative Extension-sponsored niche meat marketing conference, held last week in Modesto.
Conference speakers looked at unconventional production practices and uncommon meat types as ways for small-scale meat producers to set themselves apart. Today, most meat consumed in America is beef, pork and chicken and most is produced at centralized processing plants and shipped hundreds of miles before reaching consumers.
- Author: Jeannette E. Warnert
When New York Times garden columnist Ann Raver set out to write a folksy piece on home blueberry production, she sought expertise from a UC Cooperative Extension farm advisor 3,000 miles away.
Raver writes enviously about the wild blueberries her New Hampshire sister collects on the shores of crystal-clear lakes and around Maine mountaintop meadows, then intoduces information about growing the plants in Maryland backyards.
Even though blueberries are thought of traditionally as a crop of the North East and Pacific...
- Author: Jeannette E. Warnert
A good quote can have a long life. That was demonstrated recently when the Chicago Daily Herald used a quip by UC Cooperative Extension farm advisor Chuck Ingels in a story last week that he uttered a month and a half ago in reference to Sacramento conditions.
I mentioned the Ingels' quote in this blog on Feb. 5. In the Sacramento Bee story about postponing gardening until soil dries out, Ingels was quoted: "Soggy gardening? I try not to do...
- Author: Jeannette E. Warnert
Over the weekend, the Modesto Bee ran a comprehensive story on the olive industry, with a focus on the new UC Davis Olive Center. For the story, reporter John Holland spoke to UC Cooperative Extension's resident olive expert, farm advisor Paul Vossen.
Vossen noted that olive oil dates to antiquity, but truly fine oil came about only in the past few decades.
Stainless steel spinners and decanters replaced the old, smelly mats that had been used to drain oil from paste made of crushed olive pits and meats, according to the story. The result is an oil...
