- Author: Pamela Kan-Rice
Richard Rominger, former UC President's Advisory Commission member, passed away Dec. 20 in Winters. He was 93.
“In addition to his outstanding leadership at CDFA and USDA, Rich was always a great supporter and advisor to UC ANR. He exemplified the concept of servant leader and was a role model for myself and so many others,” said VP Glenda Humiston. “We are grateful to Rich for sharing his wisdom and kindness. He will be greatly missed.”
A fourth-generation farmer from Winters, Rominger applied his agricultural experience when he served as deputy secretary of the U.S. Department of Agriculture from 1993 to 2001, director of the California Department of Food Agriculture from 1977 to 1982 and UC alumni regent 2005 to 2006.
After he returned to California from Washington D.C., he joined the PAC in 2002. He advocated for UC ANR research as a California CARET representative and was an active PAC member until stepping down in 2019.
“Rich Rominger was a titan in the agricultural and conservation communities,” said Daniel M. Dooley, former UC vice president for External Relations and ANR, who served as chief deputy director of the California Department of Food and Agriculture (1977-80) with Rominger.
“He served in too many roles to enumerate, but his service as California Secretary of Food and Agriculture, Deputy Secretary of USDA and as a long-time member of the Board of the American Farmland Trust illustrate the breadth of his engagements,” Dooley said. “He was respected in virtually every quarter he touched. I had the pleasure to work with him at CDFA and we stayed connected professionally and socially for five decades.”
Through gifts from family and friends, Rominger helped establish the Eric Bradford and Charlie Rominger Agricultural Sustainability Leadership Award in 2008 to honor the memories of his son Charlie and UC Davis animal science professor Eric Bradford. Over the years, several UC ANR academics have been received the award for their contributions to agricultural sustainability.
“I was a dean in the Midwest when he served at USDA and learned firsthand that Rich was accessible to all,” said Reg Gomes, former UC ANR vice president. “Unlike too many bureaucrats, he listened closely, responded intelligently and left all of us feeling as though we had a fair hearing - even when he turned down our requests. When I moved to UC, I was impressed with the sheer number of ways in which he contributed to U.S. and California agriculture, UC Davis and UC as a whole.
In 2016, UC Davis awarded Rich and Evelyne UC Davis Medals, the highest honor the university presents to individuals.
“He was a titan in agriculture for sure, but what I liked and respected about Rich just as much as his leadership and vision was how he made you feel: respected, relevant, empowered, worthwhile, confident,” said Steve Nation, former director of ANR government and external relations.
Rominger is survived by his wife Evelyne, children and their spouses, Rick and Patty, Ruth and Lars, and Bruce and Robyn; daughter-in law Cairn; grandchildren Katherine, Justin, Sarah, Cienna, Aldo, John and Rachel; and great-grandson Alexander.
Donations can be made in his honor to the Yolo Land Trust located at 221 W. Court Street, Ste 5, Woodland, CA 95695, and to the Bradford-Rominger Agricultural Sustainability Leadership Award Fund at the Agricultural Sustainability Institute of UC Davis, care of CAES Deans Office University of California, located at One Shields Avenue, Davis, CA, 95616. No services are planned at this time.
Read more at https://www.legacy.com/obituaries/dailydemocrat/obituary.aspx?n=richard-e-rominger&pid=197355962.
- Author: Pamela Kan-Rice
A new partnership between UC ANR and the UC Davis Harassment and Discrimination Assistance and Prevention Program (HDAPP) was announced by John Fox, executive director of ANR Human Resources. HDAPP supports the University's commitment to a harassment-free and discrimination-free work and learning environment. With our new agreement, HDAPP will serve members of the UC ANR community by:
- assisting individuals and ANR units to resolve conflicts and complaints related to harassment, discrimination, sexual harassment, sexual violence and hate and bias; and
- serving as the central office for receiving reports and maintaining records of these types of complaints.
HDAPP is available to receive complaints of harassment or discrimination against anyone affiliated with UC ANR. If you believe you or someone you know may be experiencing any of the complaint types, or if you have questions and want to consult, contact HDAPP. Options are available to report by phone or online, as well as anonymous reporting.
They are happy to speak with you about their process, your concerns, and support resources. They strongly believe in helping people make informed decisions about reporting, including where and how to report situations of concern.
To learn more, join a Zoom session on Thursday, Feb. 4, 1:30 p.m.–3 p.m. During the Feb. 4 information session, members of the HDAPP team will describe how they handle common situations and answer questions.
You can also find more information about HDAPP at hdapp.ucdavis.edu/about-us.
HDAPP contact information and links to other reporting options are available at ucanr.edu/sites/DiscriminationSexual_Violence.
If you have any questions about the HDAPP partnership, contact Fox at jsafox@ucanr.edu.
- Author: Patrick McGuire
- Author: Paul Gepts
- Author: Calvin Qualset
Gallagher was born in San Francisco and raised in Marin County. He earned a B.A. in political science at UC Davis with his sights set on a law career. After graduation, he joined the Peace Corps and taught primary school for two years on the slopes of Mt. Kilimanjaro, Tanzania, before joining an agricultural project on the shores of Lake Turkana in Kenya.
The Kenya experience compelled Gallagher to refocus his goals on agriculture. When he returned to California, he earned a doctorate in plant genetics from UC Davis.
His first job after completing his Ph.D. was in Debre Zeit, Ethiopia. Then he joined the University of Minnesota as an assistant professor, working with their agricultural program in Morocco. He also taught plant breeding, in French, at IAV Hassan II University. Altogether, he spent eight years in Morocco teaching, breeding barley and developing an agriculture faculty there for the University of Minnesota.
The last 30 years of Gallagher's professional life were spent at UC Davis as its barley breeder. He made sure that genetic materials were shared with active breeders and that advanced materials were actively evaluated to ensure release of outstanding varieties from UC's public breeding program. He pioneered a form of participatory plant breeding that engaged growers and seed distributors to conduct on-farm field evaluations of his advanced breeding lines. Northern California Barley Growers was established to enhance the evaluation, release, and distribution of new varieties. These representatives were invited to make evaluations and selections for their own tests under UC Agricultural Experiment Station Test Agreements. This resulted in the UC releases of great many barley varieties for feed, food, forage and malting.
He had the distinction of enabling two industries in California. The first was the food industry with his development of a naked barley (free threshing). ‘Tamalpais' now appears on some restaurant menus. He resurrected the malting barley industry in California with the development and release of Butta 12, a two-rowed malting barley for the burgeoning craft brewing industry, receiving acclaim from Admiral Maltings, the Alameda-based malting company that is marketing ‘Gallagher's Best' and ‘Feldblum' malts from the Butta 12 variety. The variety has been enthusiastically received by California growers and artisan brewers, with some 280 of them brewing cumulatively over 1,000 different beers using these malts.
Gallagher recently discussed the success of Butta 12 with Ron Silberstein, co-founder and managing member of Admiral Maltings, in a podcast organized by the Crop Science Society of America.
On Lynn's passing, Silberstein noted, “Lynn has been such a mentor and inspiring resource. He has been absolutely critical to the stage of life I am in now with Admiral Maltings. There is no way I'd be doing what I'm doing without his enthusiastic help.”
Admiral Maltings, the first malting facility in California in decades, was a major final piece of the network that Gallagher helped cultivate: California-adapted malting barleys, California growers, California malt, and California brewers and distillers.
Several condolences and plaudits shared among researchers testify to Gallagher's impact on barley breeding and the careers of barley researchers. Comments have come from members of the American Malting Barley Association (AMBA) network, from scientists at the international research center in Morocco (ICARDA), from Moroccan barley breeders, many of whom were Gallagher's students in Morocco and later collaborated with him while he worked at UC Davis.
“Lynn has been an excellent contributor to ICARDA's global barley breeding program. I particularly remember him for supplying crosses with Yd2 and Yd3 combinations, which were later advanced and verified for effectiveness of BYDV resistance at Tunisia by the ICARDA team (Saafa and others),” wrote Ramesh Verma, principal barley investigator for ICAR- Indian Institute of Wheat & Barley Research in Karnal, India, and former ICARDA barley breeder in Morocco. “Secondly, he was a regular supplier of high variability germplasm/segregating lines for drought to be evaluated and shared internationally by ICARDA. I wish to put on record my sincere gratitude for his immense contributions.”
Gallagher retired at the end of 2017.
Mike Davis, president of AMBA, wrote, “I was impressed that with limited funding from various sources, including AMBA, he was able to run an effective and productive barley genetics and breeding program. “His skills as a geneticist and his dedicated and tireless efforts led to basic research, germplasm, and variety outputs of value and impact to the barley community throughout the U.S. and world.”
Gallagher is survived by his wife, Judy Smith; his brother Bill and sister-in-law Liz Gallagher of Santa Rosa; as well as two nieces and their families.
UC ANR Strategic Communications' Linda Forbes and Ricardo Vela made a video highlighting many of UCANR's 2020 accomplishments. The video is posted on YouTube at https://youtu.be/9puxX_HAC1s and the script is below. Wishing you an even more successful 2021!
2020 was a difficult and often devastating year, making our work to improve the lives of Californians all the more important. When the pandemic hit, we found innovative ways to carry out our mission.
Training people online across the spectrum of agricultural and environmental topics
Creating numerous virtual resources, from home gardening information to a new “Water and COVID-19” web page
Conducting virtual farm visits and field days
Providing critical safety information to underserved and non-English-speaking populations
Partnering with local organizations to address food insecurity
Training Californians in activities that support wellness
- Gardening
- Cooking
- Home food preservation and safety
- Physical activity and mindfulness
- Nutrition
- Organic farming
- Raising chickens
Offering private, educational and safe family tours at Elkus Ranch
Holding a COVID-safe California Naturalist intensive training for California Conservation Corps at Hopland REC
Engaging 4-H youth online – Facebook Live chick-hatching, a Disease Detectives program, virtual coding lessons, cooking demonstrations and much more
Providing more than 34,000 hours of virtual integrated pest management training
Creating an agritourism directory to connect Californians with their local farms
Providing EFNEP nutrition education curricula and other resources to teachers and community organizations
Donating 70,000 pounds of squash grown at Westside REC to the Central California Food Bank
Compiling resources for farmers, community gardeners and other people working in the food system
Helping small-scale Asian and Latino farmers complete English-language disaster aid applications
Providing critical resources and guidance on adjusting school meal service and other operations to reduce student hunger
Hosting a fun, educational virtual Pumpkin Project for students on Instagram
Throughout the year, we continued our work in wildfire prevention, disaster assistance and recovery, garnering national media attention
We provided prescribed burn training and outreach, and partnered with CAL FIRE to develop a new prescribed burn association in San Benito, Monterey and Santa Cruz.
We published guidance for city planners, fire districts and communities for reducing risk when building in fire-prone areas
We developed an app to identify hazardous trees for wildfire prevention
We delivered community workshops and training to help youth and adults reduce wildfire risk
We launched Match.Graze, a tool to connect landowners with livestock owners for vegetation management
In 2020 we pursued hundreds of critical research projects, following COVID-19 safety protocols
We studied climate change adaptation, hedgerow elderberries, strawberry fumigant alternatives, smoke and ash in food production, farmers market food safety and much more
Kearney REC stayed open to continue research on over 50 crops
We're studying mating disruption to control codling moth and navel orangeworm in walnuts, thanks to a $1 million award from CDFA
We became part of a $10 million grant from USDA focusing on adopting Kernza® to promote reduced tillage and increased carbon sequestration.
Despite the many challenges, there were more things to be proud of.
We helped increase the use of mating disruption in San Joaquin Valley almond acreage. David Haviland and Jhalendra Rijal received awards for this work from the CA Department of Pesticide Regulation and International IPM Symposium
We're leading efforts to develop an advanced wood products industry in California (Image: forest)
We launched the UC Organic Agriculture Institute, with support from Clif Bar, and chose Houston Wilson to lead it
265 participants in the 4-H Juntos program learned about educational access and success
We started the Soil Health Connection YouTube channel, a partnership between Colusa County Resource Conservation District and Sutter-Yuba Cooperative Extension
We turned our UC Master Gardener plant sale in Contra Costa County into a giveaway of 30,000 plants to benefit marginalized communities, shelters and schools
We celebrated Dr. Mary Blackburn's resolution from the Alameda County Board of Supervisors for her 50 years of service to the community – over 30 of those with UC ANR
We trained CalFresh shoppers to take advantage of the Market Match program to double the value of their benefit at farmers markets
Our Climate Smart Agriculture Community Education Specialists helped growers apply for cost-share funds from CDFA's Climate Smart Agriculture programs
Our Nutrition Policy Institute partnered with CA Department of Public Health to help restaurants comply with Senate Bill No. 1192 – so that children get healthy beverages when dining out
We shared research on tree mortality and actions that can be taken to make the forest more resilient
We were grateful for the support of our donors and partners. Our Giving Tuesday campaign broke all previous campaign records!
We're excited about all the opportunities to make a difference in 2021.
- Author: Philip A. Roberts
- Author: J. Ole Becker
Seymour Dean Van Gundy, UC Riverside professor emeritus of nematology and plant pathology, passed away peacefully at home on Dec. 27, 2020.
He was born on Feb. 24, 1931, in Toledo, Ohio. Known to family, friends and colleagues as ‘Van,' he graduated from Monclova High School, Monclova, Ohio, in 1949. Van Gundy entered Bowling Green State University on an Edwin Mosley Scholarship and graduated with a B.A. in Biology in 1953. While an undergraduate, he worked part-time at the local H.J. Heinz Crop Research Department crossing tomatoes and cucumbers and screening cucumbers for cucumber scab resistance under a collaborative program with the Department of Plant Pathology at University of Wisconsin. Plant Pathologist J.C. Walker offered him an assistantship to continue his work on cucumber angular leaf spot when he graduated in 1953.
In 1956, Van Gundy finished his Ph.D. research at the University of Wisconsin and continued as a postdoctoral student until February 1957. Dewey J. Raski, chair of the University of California Statewide Nematology Department, offered him a position in the Nematology Department at UC Riverside. Two months of training with esteemed nematologist Gerald Thorne prepared Van for his new job before going to California.
He joined the UCR Department of Nematology as a junior nematologist in March 1957. At that time, the management and damage control of nematodes attacking citrus in southern and central California was of significant economic interest. In 1958, Van researched and published the first complete life history of the citrus nematode (Tylenchulus semipenetrans). Consequently, he worked for many years on the ecology and management of citrus nematode. Nearly a decade later, he discovered the sheath nematode (Hemicycliophora arenaria), a new species parasitizing desert citrus. With the campus photographer Ken Middleham, they made the first nematode film featuring the feeding and life cycle of the sheath nematode. In 1964, he was named a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS). Van was appointed Professor of Nematology in July 1968.
During the 1965-66 academic year, Van Gundy spent a sabbatical leave in Australia working with Harry Wallace and Alan Bird to strengthen his interdisciplinary research interest in nematode ecology. In collaboration with UCR colleagues in various departments, Van continued to study resistance in citrus to the citrus nematode, the interaction of multiple nematode associations on citrus and grapevines, and the effects of soil aeration on the ecology of nematodes. He worked with Peter Tsao and Donald E. Munnecke of UCR's Department Plant Pathology on soil fungi/citrus nematode interactions and soil fumigants, respectively. From September 1968 to 1970, he served as associate dean for research in the Graduate Division at UCR.
From 1970 to 1972, Van Gundy served as assistant vice chancellor for research, and from 1972 to 1984, he was chairman of the Department of Nematology. Through his lobbying efforts, he secured state funding for the first Nematology Quarantine and Isolation facility. In 1977, in collaboration with Diana Wall, he spent a summer at the University of Alaska, Fairbanks, to study nematodes in the black spruce-permafrost ecosystem. In 1979, Van Gundy was joint appointed in the UCR Plant Pathology Department and received the title of professor of nematology and plant pathology. In 1984, he spent a sabbatical leave in Milton Schroth's laboratory in the Department of Plant Pathology at UC Berkeley studying rhizobacteria. On his return, he served in the College of Natural and Agricultural Sciences as associate dean for research from 1985 to 1988 and dean of the college from 1988 to 1993.
In the Society of Nematologists, he was instrumental in establishing the Journal of Nematology and served as its first editor-in-chief. He served as vice president and president of the Society of Nematologists and became a fellow in 1984 and honorary member in 1997. In 1978, Van Gundy was named a Fellow of the American Phytopathological Society. In 2000, he was appointed to the State Water Quality Control Board - Santa Ana Region by then California Governor Gray Davis and re-appointed in 2006 for a second term by Davis' successor Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger.
Van Gundy retired in 1993, but that did not slow him down, as he continued to work on campus under a five-year recall agreement and engaged in a range of international program activities for the college and campus. He had a voluntary but active role in the college as associate dean for International Programs. He was involved with the university's extension program, traveling to many countries to stimulate student and visiting scientist exchange with Russia, Vietnam, and Moldova, among others. In 2006, Van was inducted into Moldova's National Academy of Sciences for his formative role in developing the extension program between UCR and Moldova State University.
Van Gundy influenced many people in his life with his kindness and generosity. He will be deeply missed.
Van Gundy is survived by his wife of 66 years, Wilma, two children, three grandchildren and two great grandchildren. In lieu of flowers and to honor Van, friends may make a tax-deductible donation to benefit the Seymour and Wilma Van Gundy Endowed Undergraduate Research Fund, which was founded by Van and Wilma to support undergraduate student research in the agricultural sciences.
