Posts Tagged: bacon
Oscar Bacon: 1919-2016
DAVIS--Noted agricultural entomologist Oscar Gray Bacon, who during his 41-year UC career, chaired...
The UC Davis Department of Entomology, Feb. 3, 1970. In front (from left) are Dick Bushing, Frank Summers, Bob Schuster, Al Grigarick, Bob Washino, Harry Lange and Harry Laidlaw. In back (from left) are Charles Judson. Robbin Thorp, Vern Burton, Elmer Carlson, Oscar Bacon, Frank Strong, Don McLean, Ward Stanger and Ed Loomis. Among faculty not pictured: Stanley F. Bailey, R. M. Bohart, Warren R. Cothran, Norman Gary, G. A. H. McClelland, Howard McKenzie and Gene Stafford.
Entomologist/artist Oscar Bacon with his wood carvings; image taken in 2009. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
Just a Little Venting
Why eat terrible fruit when you can eat wonderful California fruit, or should be able to? All too often fruit which is shipped for several weeks from far off groves arrives distressed and put into cold storage here and then this is mishandled at the retailer. What the consumer ends up with is postharvest damage. Fruit that has been held too long in cold storage at the wrong temperature and you get fruit like that pictured below. Barely edible if you eat around the black stuff.
In January, I bought a bag of 4 fruit from the local store. When it had ripened, I cut open all 4 fruit and saw cold damage. I took them back to the store and they gave me another bag. When ripe, I cut them open and found the same damage. Took them back and they gave me another bag. Same thing. Took them back and asked for my money back. The produce manager said I was the only one to complain. It's a good store to back their product, but I wonder if they ever complained to their supplier. And what about the other buyers?
California can grow great fruit year-round. Some of it could be the old 'Fuerte' which is a great eating winter fruit or a 'Reed' or 'Nabal' in the summer. And some people just really like 'Zutano' or 'Bacon'. We all don't like the same taste. Add some variety to life. I was reminded of this the other day when I went to look at a recently planted 'Reed' orchard. When asked why, the grower said she loved the fruit and had a buyer for all her fruit. That's what it takes when you don't grow 'Hass', finding the market for some of these unusual varieties. Or find a packer that will take a chance on your fruit.
There's been a call for a long time on the part of growers to sell their greenskins, but the consumer needs to be taught what a good piece of fruit taste like at the right time of year. There have been lots of advocates for variety for a long time, and now that consumers have turned into 'foodies' it's time to feed them. They don't want to go to the store and buy a bad piece of fruit. And then throw it out. Instead they should go back to the store and demand a good piece of fruit.
End of rant.
avocado cold damage 1
avocado cold damage 2
Avocado Pollinizers
A trial planted in Oxnard involved eight different pollinizer varieties at three different distances from 'Hass' tree rows. Yield data collected from 2002 – 2005 suggest that the presence of pollinizer varieties in close proximity enhance the total number of fruit harvested from ‘Hass'. The influence of pollinizers on yield diminishes as the distance from the pollinizer variety increases. Differences were detected between pollinizer varieties in terms of influencing ‘Hass' yield. The highest ‘Hass' yields were observed when ‘Fuerte', ‘Zutano' and ‘SirPrize' were used as the pollinizer. The lowest cumulative yield was observed when ‘Harvest', an A-Flower type was used. Small but significant differences were also detected in percent dry weight, fruit and seed length/width ratio and seed size. For a more complete description of the trial see:
http://ucce.ucdavis.edu/files/datastore/234-2475.pdf
avocado fruit
Beyond manifesto: How to change the food system
Mark Bittman, cookbook author and New York Times food writer, used the occasion of New Year’s Day to throw down the gauntlet for real and permanent change to the U.S. agricultural system. “We must figure out a way to un-invent this food system,” he says in a Times opinion column. He likens the scale of the task to tectonic cultural strides like abolition, civil rights, and the women’s vote.
UC Berkeley researchers have been working on some specifics for several years now, researching the agricultural, policy, and social practices that would make possible the type of systemic change Bittman is advocating. In a special multi-article feature devoted to "diversified farming systems," or DFS, for the December issue of the journal Ecology & Society, scientists from Berkeley, Santa Clara University, and other institutions lay out a comprehensive scientific case that biologically diversified agricultural practices can contribute substantially to food production while creating far fewer environmental harms than industrialized, conventional monoculture agriculture—that is, large swaths of land devoted to growing single crops using chemical inputs.
DFS are different from the narrow definition of organics, and the research shows that, unlike industrial agriculture, biologically diversified agriculture tends to generate and regenerate ecosystem services such as soil fertility, pest and disease control, water-use efficiency, and pollination, which provide critical inputs to agriculture. The research also found that DFS support globally important ecosystem services, including substantially greater biodiversity, carbon sequestration, energy-use efficiency, and resilience to climate change.
But changing America’s agriculture system is more complex than just changing farming techniques, according to Alastair Iles, assistant professor of environmental science, policy, and management, and co-director of the Berkeley Center for Diversified Farming Systems.
In one Ecology & Society article, Iles and co-author Robin Marsh, also of UC Berkeley, consider several obstacles that prevent or slow the spread of diversified farming practices, such as the broader political and economic context of industrialized agriculture, the erosion of farmer knowledge and capacity, and supply chain and marketing conditions that limit the ability of farmers to adopt sustainable practices.
“To transform agriculture, we need to understand these obstacles and develop and test solutions, such as peer-to-peer learning, recruitment and retention of new farmers through access to credit and land, and compensation for ecological services provided by ranchers, for example,” Iles says.
Other key facets of a sustainable agricultural system include attention to its social dimensions, such as human health, labor, democratic participation, resiliency, diversity, equality, and ethics, according to special issue co-editor Chris Bacon of Santa Clara University. In an article with colleagues, Bacon proposes creating partnerships with institutions that could address issues like immigration, food access, and worker health.
But first and foremost, the farms themselves have to produce enough to remain profitable and to feed a growing population. Conservation biologist Claire Kremen, also a UC Berkeley professor and co-director of the Berkeley DFS Center with Iles, says that more work is needed to build on what is already known about biologically diversified agriculture, to make them these methods even more productive.
“To date, the amount of research and development investment in this type of agriculture is miniscule compared to what’s been invested in conventional agriculture,” Kremen said. “There may be substantial potential to increase food production from biologically diversified, sustainable agriculture that we have not yet tapped into. With research support to study and improve on sustainable farming systems, we can tap that potential. Growers want to utilize sustainable practices if they can, but they need to know it won’t hurt their bottom line.”
So, DFS scientists might argue, Bittman’s New Year’s manifesto, which ends with a call for “energy, action — and patience,” could be amended to include “a comprehensive scientific, political, and sociological approach, and putting dollars behind the right kinds of research.”
Read more about diversified farming systems research at UC Berkeley.
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