'On the road' reporter visits with UC Cooperative Extension advisor

Reporter Cary Blake of Western Farm Press visited with UC Cooperative Extension advisor Mark Battany during a California road trip being chronicled in the magazine's new Farm Press Blog. Battany is a viticulture expert serving San Luis Obispo and Santa Barbara counties.

The topic of his conversation with Blake was water, or more specifically, the lack thereof.

Battany said local groundwater levels in the Paso Robles area continue to decline. He is conducting research as part of a two-state project (California and Washington) to improve water efficiency in wine-grape production.

Farm's experiment with no-till cotton shows promise
Cecelia Parsons, AgAlert

Danny Ramos, the innovative manager of Lucero Farms near Dos Palos, welcomed growers and researchers to view no-till cotton being cultivated at the ranch.

"No one else in California has done no-till cotton on this scale, and done it successfully," said Jeff Mitchell, UC Cooperative Extension specialist in the Department of Plant Sciences at UC Davis.

The crop follows four years of tomatoes and dry farmed wheat that was planted last winter. Without rain, the wheat failed. He decided to shred the plants and plant cotton into the residue.

The no-till field is using less water than an adjacent tilled field, Ramos said.

"With high water costs, no-till is the way to go," he said.

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