- Author: Thomas J Getts
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Students, it is the time of year to apply for the CWSS Student Scholarship! Awards will be given to both graduate and undergraduate students ranging from $1,000-2,000. Any students interested in Weed Science should apply! Click here to submit an application and for further instruction.
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This year in January at the California Weed Science Society (CWSS) annual conference, we had numerous outstanding students present their recent research in the field of weed science. In total we had 12 students participate in the contest, but there is always room for more! If you know of any undergraduate or graduate students who are interested in weeds, I would encourage them to get involved with the CWSS. It is a great conference with many networking and learning opportunities.
This year we had one winner in the undergraduate student poster contest.
- 1st Place Undergraduate Student Poster - Sawyer William Claussen, California Polytechnic University San Luis Obispo (Steinmaus Lab) - Biannual Crop Rotation as an Effective Weed Management Method
For the Graduate Student Contest, the two prize winners were from UC Davis!
- 1st Place Graduate Poster - Stephen Chang, UC Davis (Hanson Lab) - Evaluating the Effect of Endothall-treated Irrigation Water on California Crops
- 2nd Place Graduate Poster - Erika Escalona, UC Davis (Fennimore Lab) - Evaluating Bacterial Diversity and Efficacy of Steam Fumigation Treatments in the Salinas Valley's Lettuce and Spinach Fields
Fresno State swept the oral competition this year!
- 1st Place Graduate Paper - Robert Willmott, Fresno State University (Shrestha Lab) - Cover Crops Combined with Strip Tilling Reduces Herbicide Use in Silage Corn
- 2nd Place Graduate Paper - Jennifer Valdez Herrera, Fresno State University (Shrestha Lab) - Developing an Integrated Management System for Common Chickweed (Stellaria media) Control in Small Grain Crops in the Central Valley
If you see any of these excellent students, make sure to give them a big congratulations! And encourage students you know to apply for the scholarship program!
- Author: Kathy Keatley Garvey
Well, there's good news and there's bad news.
The good news: Art Shapiro found and collected a cabbage white butterfly (Pieris rapae) on Jan. 2, the day after New Year's Day, in a mustard patch along the railroad tracks in West Sacramento, Yolo County. The bad news: it's a 2015 butterfly, not a 2016 one. In other words, it's a fall brood spillover, and the contest is still underway.
Shapiro, distinguished professor of evolution and ecology at the University of California, Davis, sponsors the annual contest as part of his four-decade study of climate and butterfly seasonality.
The contest works like this: The first person finding a cabbage white butterfly within the three-county area of Sacramento, Solano and Yolo--and verified by Shapiro as the first of 2016--will receive a pitcher of beer or its equivalent.
"The cabbage white is typically one of the first butterflies to emerge in late winter," says Shapiro, who launched the contest in 1972. "Since 1972, the first flight has varied from Jan. 1 to Feb. 22, averaging about Jan. 20.”
Although the first flight of the cabbage white has been as late as Feb. 22, Shapiro says it is emerging earlier and earlier as the regional climate has warmed. “There have been only two occasions in the 21st century in which it has come out this late: Jan 26, 2006 and Jan 31, 2011.”
Shapiro, who has monitored the butterfly populations of Central California since 1971, has one of the two largest butterfly databases in the world. He maintains a research website at http://butterfly.ucdavis.edu.
The professor usually wins his own contest because he knows where to look. The butterfly inhabits vacant lots, fields, and gardens where its host plants, weedy mustards, grow.
The cabbage white is regarded as a pest of cole crops (cabbage, kale, Brussels sprouts, cauliflower, radish, horseradish, arugula, canola, mustard, etc.) "It is generally the commonest butterfly in and around urban and suburban areas, and routinely visits gardens," he says.
As for his catch on New Year's Day, Shapiro opted to look for it in West Sacramento (south side of the railroad embankment) where he had seen two cabbage whites on Dec. 22. "There had been two rapae there on the 22nd and at that time I had forecast a potential fall brood spillover into January, as happened in 1990 and 2013 and possibly 2012--there was a long lag time after the last December 2011 record."
New Year's Day, 2016, was overcast. "By 1:20 I had about given up and there were only brief sunny intervals. Then I noticed the triangular white form of a dorsal-basking rapae among dead annual litter! Once I convinced myself that's what it was--not a piece of paper--I caught it. It never took flight and it may have been too cold to do so."
The live catch is now in his Storer Hall lab. "It's an old male, definitely frazzled, the hindwing undersides faded, unambiguously autumn-phenotype and a 2015, not a 2016 bug. So the record goes in the book--first for 2016--but the contest remains open, as in prior spillover years."
Shapiro does not expect the first cabbage white of 2016 "very soon" due to lack of vegetation and inclement weather.
"The vegetation looks terrible," he explained. "There has been very little germination of Crucifers (mustard family) since November. Most of the non-grass seedlings are yellow star thistle and milk thistle; even Conium (carrot famiy) is scarce. There are areas, mainly under standing litter, where nothing has germinated at all."
Rain is forecast for much of the week and next week. "Although it's a sort-of El Nino pattern (lasting maybe through Saturday) and there is a chance of measurable rain every day next week (except Sunday), amounts will not be huge," Shapiro predicts.
The contest rules include:
- It must be an adult (no caterpillars or pupae) and be captured outdoors.
- It must be brought in alive to the department office, 2320 Storer Hall, UC Davis, during work hours, 8 a.m. to 5 p.m., Monday through Friday, with the full data (exact time, date and location of the capture) and your name, address, phone number and/or e-mail. The receptionist will certify that it is alive and refrigerate it. (If you collect it on a weekend or holiday, keep it in a refrigerator; do not freeze. A few days in the fridge will not harm it.)
- Shapiro is the sole judge.
Shapiro has been defeated only three times since 1972. And all by his graduate students. Adam Porter defeated him in 1983; and Sherri Graves and Rick VanBuskirk each won in the late 1990s.
- Author: Lennis Arriaga
Natividad 4-H is hosting the Dessert Contest this year. Please bring your best dessert entry by 8:48 am on February 2nd 2013 to the dessert area at Soledad High School. Please bring your entry on a non-returnable container or plate. Please place your name, club, age and category it will be place in on the bottom of your entry. There will be a Special Award for People’s Choice Dessert.
Prizes will be awarded in each age category and dessert category, and they are as follows:
Age Categories: 5-8 years old, 9-11 years old, 12-14 years old, 15 and older
Dessert Categories:
- Death by Chocolate- anything chocolate
- Tricks with a mix- Get creative using a mix for something different. Please provide the recipe
- Best 4-H themed dessert- decorate your dessert with your best 4-H design
Please provide a minimum of
- 2 dozen cookies
- Brownies, bar cookies or sheet cake 9x13 pan uncut
- Round cakes 9” round uncut
- Cupcakes 2 dozen
Rules:
Open to all Monterey County 4-H members except those on the Dessert judging committee. Members must have done the baking themselves. 1 entry per category per member. You don’t need to be in a foods or baking project to enter.
- Author: Katherine E Heck
The LegiSchool Project is opening its annual essay contest for 11th and 12th graders in California schools. This year's topic is childhood obesity.
The LegiSchool Project's Annual Essay Contest: Keeping California’s Kids Healthy: the fight against childhood obesity.
We are currently seeking entries for LegiSchool’s annual essay contest, Keeping California’s Kids Healthy: The fight against childhood obesity. The contest is open to eleventh and twelfth grade students in California high schools. Ten essayists will be selected to win round trip travel to Sacramento to participate in LegiSchool’s 15th Annual Student Legislative Summit, on April 6, 2011. At the Student Legislative Summit, winners will participate in a Student-Run Press Conference at the State Capitol. Entries must be postmarked by Friday, January 21, 2011. Please see the attached announcement for details and share it with your students. For more information or additional fliers please visit our website at: http://www.csus.edu/legischool.
The LegiSchool Project is a civic education collaboration between California State University, Sacramento and the State Legislature, administered by the Center for California Studies. LegiSchool’s mission is to engage young people in matters of public policy and state government by creating opportunities for students and state leaders to meet and share ideas on issues affecting Californians and by developing free high-quality government-oriented curriculum materials for California educators to enhance and help improve the quality of state government-related curriculum in our schools.
For more information, or if you have any questions, please contact me at thorall@saclink.csus.edu or (916) 278-7563.
Megan Thorall
LegiSchool Coordinator
Center for California Studies
California State University, Sacramento