- Author: Jeannette E. Warnert
University of California Cooperative Extension advisors and specialists are go-to people for the press when they are looking for expertise on a wide variety of topics. Here are a couple subjects UC academics tackled in recent days:
Suburban coyotes culled - Los Angeles Times
Times reporter Joe Monzingo wrote a feature story on suburban coyote trapper Jimmie Rizzo. According to the article, coyotes are becoming an increasing problem in some Southern California neighborhoods, putting small dogs, cats and even young children at risk. The article cited a 2004 UC Davis finding that the first...
- Author: Jeannette E. Warnert
The only sustainable and organic agriculture coordinator in the UC Cooperative Extension system, Steven Quirt of the Marin County office, is an informative source for media covering local agriculture. That proved true again this week when Quirt was quoted extensively in a Marin Independent Journal story that opened seasonably with a vignette about organic turkey.
By the second paragraph, the story became more of a trend piece on the growth of organic agriculture in the swanky, yet earthy Northern California locale. According to the article, the amount of Marin County land in organic production has increased 6,000 percent since 1999 to 24,176 acres....
- Author: Jeannette E. Warnert
The director of the UC Small Farm Center, Shermain Hardesty, said there are a number of hurdles California small-scale farmers must overcome to compete in state's highly industrialized food production and distribution system, according to a recent Bakersfield Californian news story. The article, written by Jeff Nactigal, centered on Community Supported Agriculture, or CSA, a system in which consumers pay a monthly subscription and receive a weekly supply of produce, typically organically grown.
Featured farmer Vernon Peterson started his CSA 10 months ago with 50 subscribers and now delivers more than 1,000 boxes of organic produce to 20...
- Author: Jeannette E. Warnert
Kermit the Frog's cute lament about being green was used to introduce a story in the Vacaville Reporter recently on the movement to eat "green" by purchasing organic food.
Organic producers say their products are more nutritious, safer, tastier and better for the environment because herbicides and pesticides are not used, wrote freelance reporter Elizabeth Long.
Critics, however, say organic agriculture requires more land to produce the same amount of food, land that should be conserved for wildlife.
For the story, Long spoke with Tom Tomich, director of the Agricultural Sustainability...
- Author: Jeannette E. Warnert
UC Davis plant pathologist Pamela Ronald has an idea that might make collaborators out of Californians who have commonly been at cross purposes. Ronald suggested that combining genetic engineering with organic farming may be the best way to grow food for a growing world population facing climate change and environmental degradation.
In a story with a Hong Kong dateline, Ronald told Reuters the world needed to use every technology available to secure food supplies for the 9.2 billion people expected by 2050, up from the current 6.7...