- Author: Pamela Kan-Rice
How they survived: Owners of the few homes left standing around Paradise, Calif., took critical steps to ward off wildfires
(Washington Post) Sarah Kaplan, Frances Stead Sellers, Nov. 30
…Though the United States spends upwards of $2 billion each year on fire suppression and billions more helping communities recover, the current budget for the Federal Emergency Management Agency's Pre-Disaster Mitigation Grant Program is just over $200 million — and it must address hurricanes, earthquakes and a host of other natural hazards as well as fires. Cal Fire provides grants for forest management and tree removal, but not structure modification.
The budget for the University of California...
- Author: Jeannette E. Warnert
UC Cooperative Extension has sent out pleas to farmers, farm advisors, pest control advisors and others for contributions to two current research projects.
Lynn Sosnoskie, assistant project scientist in the Department of Plant Sciences at UC Davis, is asking for seed samples collected from mature junglerice plants to evaluate for glyphosate resistance, reported Todd Fitchette in Western Farm Press.
Resistance to glyphosate (best know by the brand name Roundup) in junglerice and other weeds is of particular importance to small-acreage, specialty crop farmers due to...
- Author: Jeannette E. Warnert
It has been particularly cold at night in California for about a week, but it appears the state's citrus industry will emerge mostly unscathed, reported Oliver Renick on Bloomberg.com.
“The temperatures were not severe enough to cause widespread damage,” said Craig Kallsen, UC Cooperative Extension advisor in Kern County. “This is nothing out of the ordinary, so we’re able to handle this.”
Thermometers dipped about 10 degrees below normal overnight during the cold snap, but growers efforts to keep the trees warm with wind...
- Author: Jeannette E. Warnert
Citrus growers in Florida, who are struggling with the devastating citrus disease huanglongbing, are considering growing olives, according to a report on the Tampa, Fla., ABC news affiliate.
Reporter Ryan Raiche covered a meeting at the University of Florida Citrus Research and Extension Center where UC Cooperative Extension farm advisor Paul Vossen introduced growers to olive production and marketing and offered citrus growers the opportunity to taste a variety of olives and olive oils.
“This is not a slam dunk, because this is a...
- Author: Jeannette E. Warnert
A new, virtually seed-free mandarin will for the first time be sold in California grocery stores, but consumers may not even notice, according to an AP story by Jeff Nachtigal published late last week. Google News reports that the article made its way into about 200 news outlets.
The story was also written up by reporter Mark Muckenfuss of the Riverside Press-Enterprise in mid-January.
UC Riverside began releasing budwood for Tango mandarins in 2006; more than a million trees are now growing in California. Their first commercial crop is being...
