- Author: Brad Hanson
Last Thursday (March 15, 2018), the Western Governors' Association released its first ever list of the top 50 invasive species (25 terrestrial, 25 aquatic) important in the western US. This list includes a number of plant, animal, insects, and pathogens.
Weeds were 18 of 25 in the terrestrial list and 10 of 25 and in the aquatic list. Both lists had weeds in the #1 slot (tamarisk and Eurasian watermilfoil, respectively.
Here's a link the the press release: http://westgov.org/news/wgas-top-50-invasive-species-in-the-west-offers-first-regional-report
Here's a link to...
- Author: Brad Hanson
Long-time member of the California weed science community Steve Orloff passed away on October 3, 2017 after a brief fight with cancer.
Steve spent his 33 year career as a UC Cooperative Extension Farm Advisor, initially in the high desert of southern California and for the past 20+ years in northern California in Siskiyou County. Steve was an important contributor to the UC's weed science program but he was perhaps even more engaged with researchers, farmers, and the agricultural industry as a forage and cereals agronomist. Dan Putnam and Rob Wilson wrote a really
- Author: Brad Hanson
A quick post today to share a link to the recently revised "UC IPM Pest Management Guidelines for Walnut" (UC ANR Publication #3471). You can download the whole document as a pdf here, or use it online at the above link
Lots of great sections on management of non-weed pests of walnut, but since this is the Weed Science blog, here's the direct link to Integrated Weed Management section authored this time by:
- J. A. Roncoroni, UC Cooperative Extension, Napa County
- B. D....
- Author: Brad Hanson
Yesterday, the Weed Science Society of America honored several members for their outstanding contributions to the Society and the discipline.
Among the awardees this year was, Dr. Joe DiTomaso, Professor and Cooperative Extension Specialist at UC Davis. Joe received the Outstanding Research Award which was established to recognize research contributions in both applied and basic weed science that demonstrated originality and creativity and had an impact on the field. The Weed Science Society (and his UC colleagues) congratulate Joe DiTomaso on this award and for career-long impact and leadership.
An undergraduate Plant Science student working in the UC Davis weed science...
- Author: Brad Hanson
Several years ago, I had what seemed like a great weed research idea.
My idea addressed a serious agricultural weed problem in California, it was applicable to several cropping systems, it used an integrated approach to weed management, and it utilized a pretty novel approach (or so I thought). I proudly laid out this idea to my UC weed science colleague at a meeting, only to hear "That's great Brad but I think your predecessor tried that in the late 80's and it didn't work very well". After my damaged pride recovered a bit, I started thinking about the volume of research that we do that is not very easy to find out about after it is done.
As scientists, we often think about...