- Author: Jeannette E. Warnert
A Bakersfield farming cooperative will lay off 2,100 permanent seasonal workers and instead hire a labor force through farm labor contractors, reported Jill Cowan in the Bakersfield Californian. The shift toward hiring seasonal workers through farm labor contractors is not new, said University of California Cooperative Extension specialist emeritus Howard Rosenberg, who has studied agricultural labor management for decades.
"(Use of farm labor contractors) has grown from the low 20 percents, to now over 40 percent," Rosenberg said, "and some people would...
- Author: Jeannette E. Warnert
The Colorado farm linked to a deadly listeria outbreak last fall is 1,300 miles away, but the tragedy changed a way of life in Mendota, Calif., the Central Valley farm town that proudly calls itself the Cantaloupe Center of the World, said an article in the Los Angeles Times by Diana Marcum.
This would normally be the season when farmers plan the summer crop that in good years is valued at nearly $200 million, according to the California Cantaloupe Advisory Board. Instead, they are cutting acreage and scrambling for ways to reassure a nervous public that cantaloupes are safe to eat.
This month the
- Author: Jeannette E. Warnert
Another pest has been added to the list of exotic insects that dishearten California farmers. The brown marmorated stink bug, a destructive native of Asia, has been seen this spring in 33 states, including California, Oregon and Washington, according to the San Francisco Chronicle.
"All that we do know for certain is that a tremendously large population went into overwintering in fall 2010. So, if they survived, there could be a very large population emerging in the spring," the story quoted Tracy Leskey, a research entomologist at the U.S. Agriculture Department's Appalachian Fruit Research Station in Kearneysville,...
- Author: Jeannette E. Warnert
People involved in agriculture rarely complain about rain, but the latest series of winter storms has folks talking.
The San Joaquin Valley Viticulture Facebook page, maintained by UC Davis viticulture specialist Matt Fidelibus and Fresno County UC Cooperative Extension farm advisor Stephen Vasquez, reported on the drenching in the center of California.
"We've received more than two inches of rain at Parlier in the last 48 hours, and rain is likely for 7 of the next 10 days," read a post made at 4 p.m. on Monday.
- Author: Jeannette E. Warnert
Three European grapevine moths found recently in a northeast Merced County vineyard mean six grape-growing California counties are now dealing with the new pest, according to an article over the weekend in the Fresno Bee.
The pest, a native of southern Italy, made its first California appearance last fall in Napa County. It has also been trapped in Solano, Sonoma, Mendocino and Fresno counties.
Writer Robert Rodriguez reported that the Merced agricultural commissioner was surprised by the local find. Only about 12,000 acres of vineyards are within the county borders; by contrast, Fresno County as 190,000 acres.
Fresno...
