- Author: Jeannette E. Warnert
Coincidentally, two news releases were distributed yesterday with information from UC Ag and Natural Resources about climate change.
One news release announces the current issue of California Agriculture journal, which is devoted to news and research on climate change and how it will alter California’s environment and landscape, agriculture and food quality. The cover of the magazine says climate change is "unequivocal," a word pulled from the 2007 report the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.
"Warming of the climate system is unequivocal, as is now evident from observations of increases in global average air and ocean...
- Author: Jeannette E. Warnert
J.G. Boswell, the founder and head of the enormous family-owned farming concern J.G. Boswell Co., passed away last week at the age of 86. As an innovative cotton farmer in the San Joaquin Valley and influential advocate in land and water resource policy, Boswell's path often intersected with UC Cooperative Extension.
Boswell inherited the company when he was 29 from his uncle, also named J.G. Boswell, according to an obituary published today in the Los Angeles Times. His farm spans 150,000 acres near the San Joaquin Valley town of Corcoran. In addition to farming, the company...
- Author: Jeannette E. Warnert
An article in the Martinez News-Gazette said "vocal lobbying by the Contra Costa 4-H members and their parents" influenced the Contra Costa Board of Supervisors to maintain its funding support for UC Cooperative Extension until June 30.
Indicators had been that funding would end immediately. The board's decision gives the program time to seek “other funding mechanisms," wrote reporter Greta Mark, attributing the comment to "4-H officials."
Mark wrote that supervisor Gayle Uilkema told the newspaper the board planned to discontinue its "$352,000 in annual funding to the 4-H in an...
- Author: Jeannette E. Warnert
On Friday, two reporters joined ranchers and UC, Fresno State and US Forest Service academics at the San Joaquin Experimental Range for a field day, presentations and barbecue marking the centennial of the Forest Service's research program. At the event, officials signed a new memorandum of understanding outlining the research goals and administrative arrangements for the 4,500-acre facility.
As part of the agreement, UC Cooperative Extension farm advisor and county director for Madera County, Neil McDougald, takes on the role of site manager for the sprawling oak woodland research facility 26 miles north of Fresno.
Dennis Pollock, a freelance reporter for AgAlert, took a guided tour of riparian areas on the station, and...
- Author: Jeannette E. Warnert
Even though Salmonella scares are reverberating in the news media, UC Davis Cooperative Extension food safety specialist Linda Harris says that, overall, the nation's food supply is safe.
Comments from Harris, a food-safety microbiologist at the Western Institute for Food Safety and Security at UC Davis, appeared in a story by Barbara Anderson in today's Fresno Bee.
"I would hate for consumers to approach the grocery store with trepidation," Harris was quoted in a story published today. Most of the food in grocery stores, she told the reporter, has been processed in some way that reduces or eliminates...
