Safe, healthy and happy Thanksgiving
Sixth-graders save a tree
A group of sixth-grade students didn't stop at hugging a beloved tree at Mt. Madonna County Park, they came equipped to administer life-saving treatment, according to a story in yesterday's Santa Cruz Sentinel. The Mt. Madonna School students are aiming to protect a tanoak believed to be among the largest in California from Sudden Oak Death.
The children were led by their teacher, James Rohan, who attended a UC Berkeley training session with foresters and nursery owners to learn how to treat at-risk trees. According to the Sentinel story, the students drilled 20 small holes around the tree's trunk, injected them with Agri-Fos and plugged the holes with clay.
Agri-Fos is the only proven remedy for SOD, researchers say. It works by boosting a tree's natural defenses. It is not a cure, but it can help protect trees from getting infected and suppress disease progression in very early infections.
Reporter Roger Sideman spoke to UC Davis forest pathologist David Rizzo about the Agri-Fos treatment. Rizzo said that, at a cost of $200 per tree, Agri-Fos is not practical for saving an entire forest, but the treatment's cost seems more reasonable to homeowners who risk property damage and the expense of removal if a large tree dies.
Rizzo tells homeowners that their trees are at particular risk if they are positioned near rhododendrons or bay laurel trees, both carriers of the pathogen that causes sudden oak death, the story said.
A tree being injected with Agri-Fos.
UCCE budget uncertainty covered in Davis Enterprise
Director of the UC Cooperative Extension office in Yolo County, Kent Brittan, has found a way to maintain the jobs of county-paid staff even as the Board of Supervisors cut the organization's budget 11.4 percent compared to last year. The five people will each cut their hours - and therefore their pay - by 20 percent, according to a story in the Davis Enterprise.
That means no one loses a job, but also that the Woodland UCCE office will be closed on Mondays. The reduced schedule will affect all extension programs, from the county's 4-H program to pest control on farms and at the Davis Community Gardens, Brittan said told reporter Jonathan Edwards.
"That affects research projects, that affects people's salaries — it's a huge impact to the university," Brittan was quoted. "It will be a huge number by the time we're done. And it's not just this year — it's going to be next year and the year after that. It's going to take the state a number of years to crawl out of this."
The article notes that the 11.4 percent budget cut is to the county's fraction of the total UCCE budget. Academics' salaries and supplies are financed with $1.6 million from UC and USDA.
"Both the county and UC are tied to the state of California, which faces a $24.3 billion budget deficit. Eyeing that number, UC President Mark Yudof said an $800 million reduction in state funding will mean tough choices," Edwards wrote.
Merced Sun-Star marks fig season
Trees around the Valley are laden with ripening figs, according to an article in the Merced Sun-Star today that said harvest typically takes place in the final weeks of June. Writer Jonah Owen Lamp centered his story on the fig orchard of Tonetta Gladwin, a third-generation fig grower in Merced County.
"I believe that Eve gave Adam a fig, not an apple," she was quoted in the story, adding that apples are not indigenous to the Middle East. "The fig was the downfall of man."
However, she said, the fresh fig still has an anonymity in the U.S. produce industry. Lamb turned to UC Cooperative Extension farm advisor Maxwell Norton for perspective on Merced's fresh fig industry.
He said 12 farmers tend the 2,000 acres in Merced County that are planted to figs. While most of the growers sell dried figs, the 10 percent growing fresh figs has been on the rise for some time.
Norton said that part of the reason so few people buy fresh figs in America is that they are relatively unknown. That's surprising considering their prominent role in the creation story shared by many Christians, Jews and Muslims scattered all over the world.
Islamic Adam and Eve.
Unraveling a lead contamination quandry
Oregonian blogger Carrie Sturrock called around the country on a quest for commentary about lead contamination in her own backyard. One of the sources she found was UC Cooperative Extension's Don Hodel of Los Angeles County.
Sturrock wrote that she lives in a house built in 1911, well before regulations banned lead in house paint. She deduced that lead sluffed, scraped or sanded from the siding may be in the soil, so she wanted to find out whether eating home-grown fruits and vegetables posed a health risk.
Soil testing revealed elevated levels of lead in her backyard soil. However, Hodel assured her, "Plants don't take it up that much. ... I really don't think it's a danger."
Another scientist had a different opinion. Wendy Heiger-Bernays, an associate professor of environmental health at Boston University School of Public Health, said that at 300 ppm or greater, leafy greens and herbs can take lead up in greater amounts.
Sturrock concluded that she won't quit gardening, but will take some precautions.
"I had thought about growing strawberries on the soil that's at 306 (ppm), but now I don't know -- maybe I'll try tomatoes, which are tall plants," she wrote. "As for the raspberry bushes, most everyone said I shouldn't worry about eating the fruit. Just wash it first."
Suicide prevention a topic for UCCE webinar
The dire economic straits in which many California dairy operators find themselves have prompted UC Cooperative Extension to collaborate with other agencies to provide a suicide prevention online seminar, according to an article in Dairy Herd Management.
The webinar, held this morning, covered farmer stress, depression and suicide prevention. According to an article published in the Los Angeles Times late last month, two dairy operators have recently committed suicide. Low milk prices that have dairy farmers selling cows for hamburger meat and threatening to dump milk into sewers may be partly to blame.
Current milk prices are about half of what it costs California producers to feed and milk their herds, the Times article said. Every gallon sold in the supermarket represents a loss on the farm. The pain is being felt throughout the U.S., but it's especially severe in California, where1,800 dairies produce $7 billion worth of milk annually, more than one-fifth of the nation's supply.
The Dairy Herd Management article ends with links to additional resources, including a story in the May issue of the magazine, Recognize the Signs of Stress and Depression and a link to its Crisis Management Resource Center.