- Author: Jeannette E. Warnert
UC Davis Cooperative Extension watershed specialist Ken Tate and interim director of the Western Institute for Food Safety and Security at UC Davis Rob Atwill will design and conduct the study. The first samples have already been...
- Author: Jeannette E. Warnert
UC Davis Cooperative Extension researchers Ken Tate and Rob Atwill responded to a story about High Sierra grazing published last month in the Sacramento Bee in the California Farm Bureau Federation's newspaper AgAlert.
The Sacramento Bee story suggested that cattle grazing in high-elevation areas of the Sierra Nevada causes water contamination. Following is an opening excerpt of Atwill and Tate's commentary. See the AgAlert link for the complete 600-word response:
- Author: Jeannette E. Warnert
U.S. Forest Service regional forester Randy Moore said the agency and its collaborators take the quality of high Sierra water seriously, according to an op-ed article that ran in the Sacramento Bee over the weekend.
The op-ed came after a May 1 Sac Bee editorial encouraging the Forest Service to limit grazing to lower elevations.
Moore wrote that the Forest Service is working with the State Water Resources Control Board to develop a water quality management plan for California national forests. The plan will establish best-management...- Author: Jeannette E. Warnert
Forage monitoring at the UC Sierra Research and Extension Center in Browns Valley shows the land produced, on average, 2,984 pounds of vegetation per acre, 93.4 percent of normal, according to an article published today in Capital Press. That may sound fantastic - 93.4 percent looks like an A to me. But UCCE farm advisor Larry Forero said that the growth came too late for most ranchers.
In fact, in nearby Tehama County, officials are seeking a federal disaster declaration because of drought damage to its rangelands. Reporter Tim Hearden wrote that...
- Author: Jeannette E. Warnert
The Modesto Bee ran a story over the weekend with a headline that proclaims, "Experts positive about effect of grazing on land." It is remarkable, in my opinion, because scientists are so rarely "positive" about anything and are very adept at using conditional wording, such as seemingly, may be, could be, almost, nearly, etc.
On the other hand, the headline writer may have been using the meaning of "positive" as merely the opposite of "negative."
The story was based on reporter John Holland's take on a recent Tuolumne County Resource Conservation District seminar, in which participants learned that grazing...
