Salinas Valley Agriculture

With warming weather come contemplations of bagrada bug. This is the time in the past when we start to find bagrada bug populations on flourishing shortpod mustard plants or patches of pepperweed in the Salinas Valley.

I have been receiving phone calls about the presence of red aphids in organic romaine lettuce that is resistant to the lettuce aphid, Nasonovia ribis-nigri (Hemiptera: Aphididae, Fig. 1). The lettuce aphid is considered a difficult pest to manage.

Summary These studies provided insight into nitrogen (N) management of leafy green vegetables.

A new race of the downy mildew pathogen (Peronospora farinosa f. sp. spinaciae = P. effusa) on spinach was first identified in 2014 in Yuma, Arizona, U.S. This race was able to overcome the resistance of important spinach varieties.

Spinach is an accumulator of cadmium (Cd) and an important crop in the California Salinas Valley, where some agricultural soils have naturally high levels of Cd.