- Author: Jeannette E. Warnert
Across the United States, Americans are buying and growing plants as a pick-me-up during the COVID-19 crisis, reported Lisa Irizarry in Newsday. The paper focused its story on Long Island, N.Y., its area of local circulation, but turned to UC Cooperative Extension emeritus advisor Rose Hayden-Smith for commentary about the trend.
Hayden-Smith is the author of "Sowing the Seeds of Victory - American Gardening Programs of World War I" and now serves as the educational technology fellow for eXtension, an organization that helps extension...
- Author: Jeannette E. Warnert
Considered among the most important agricultural innovations in the world, drip irrigation has been researched for decades. UC Cooperative Extension weed management advisor Aliasghar Montazar has taken a close look at its application in organic spinach cultivation, reported Matthew Grassi in Growing Produce.
Not only does drip irrigation use less water than irrigation with sprinklers, the slow emission of water near plant roots also diminishes the crops' susceptibility to disease. Growers believe that ongoing issues with downy mildew is at least partially caused by...
- Author: Pamela Kan-Rice
Coronavirus's next victim: Big Meat
(Grist) Nathanael Johnson, April 30
“It's going to cause price spikes somewhere downstream,” said Rich Sexton, an agricultural economist at the University of California, Davis. But the average shopper might only notice empty shelves rather than higher prices, because “big grocery chains don't like to jack up prices, especially in times like this.”
…“There is going to be even more of a rush to automate farmwork and slaughterhouses,” Sexton said.
- Author: Pamela Kan-Rice
Pandemic And Wildfire: California Is Preparing For A Crisis Within A Crisis
(CapRadio) Ezra David Romero, April 15
…To protect human health, prescribed burns are not allowed for the time being on Forest Service land. But Ryan Tompkins, a forest advisor with the UC Cooperative Extension for Plumas, Sierra, and Lassen counties, says it's still early enough to prepare for wildfire with other tools like thinning and in some cases burning.
“It is really difficult because of the concerns about smoke and COVID, but sort of now is our chance to be...
- Author: Jeannette E. Warnert
Like flour, yeast, toilet paper and hand sanitizer, all over the country there's been a run on chicks, wrote Diana Williams in a article published by the Sacramento Bee. The author and her family adopted four chicks, and as they grew, so did her thirst for information on raising chickens at home.
"Imagine my delight in stumbling across a backyard chicken census online," Williams wrote.
The website, managed by UC Cooperative Extension epidemiology specialist and veterinarian Maurice Pitesky, offers...