Posts Tagged: conservation agriculture regenerative agriculture
CASI honored with SWCS 2022 Conservation Innovation Award - August 2, 2022
CASI honored with SWCS 2022 Conservation Innovation Award - August 2, 2022
August 4, 2022
California's Conservation Agriculture Systems Innovation (CASI) Center was recognized as the recipient of the 2022 Conservation Innovation Award by the Soil and Water Conservation Society at their Annual Conference held in Denver, CO from July 31 through August 3rd 2022. Tom Willey, retired organic farmer in Madera, CA and long-time CASI member received the award on behalf of our entire group and also presented a summary of work currently being done by a group of California organic farmers on reduced disturbance systems. The 2022 Award recognizes many years of dedicated service that CASI members have provided in extending information and increasing the adoption of improved performance production systems in California since 1998 when the organization was founded. Tom also had the opportunity to meet USDA NRCS national Chief Tom Cosby at the Denver conference and he invited the Chief to meet with CA CIG Project organic farmers when he is coming to the state in September 2022.
Tom Willey receiving SWCS recognition in Denver CO 2022
CASI's Mitchell helps with interview on KVPR's Valley Report - January 14, 2022
CASI's Mitchell helps with KVPR interview on climate change
January 16, 2022
CASI's very own Jeff Mitchell, along with UC ANR colleagues Mae Culumber, George Zhuang, Karl Lund, and Bob Hutmacher, helped with information on their research that is related to climate change in an interview with KVPR reporter, Kerry Klein, at the UC West Side field station on January 14th 2022. The segment was part of the Valley Report on KVPR and was titled, “Climate change resilience begins with water say these UC ag researchers.” An audio recording and a copy of the report written by Klein are available at https://www.kvpr.org/environment/2022-01-14/climate-change-resilience-begins-with-water-say-these-uc-ag-researchers
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Capture KVPR January 14, 2022JPG
GOOGLE and The Lexicon of Sustainability visit CASI's NRI Project in Five Points, CA - September 3, 2021
September 3, 2021
Michiel Bakker, the Vice President for Global Workplace Programs for GOOGLE, along with Douglas Gayeton, the creative leader for The Lexicon of Sustainability (https://www.thelexicon.org/ ), spent a full day on September 3, 2021 first visiting the NRI Project field in Five Points, CA and then the farms of John Diener right up the road, and of Phil Foster in Hollister, CA. The purpose of their visit was to learn about and see efforts that are being made to realize conservation (or more recently, “regenerative”) agriculture systems here in California. CASI's Jeff Mitchell coordinated the day's tour that also included retired Madera, CA organic farmer, Tom Willey.
While at the NRI study site, the group looked at several reduced disturbance pieces of equipment and also witnessed the increased aggregation of long-term no-till and cover cropped soils in the NRI field compared to that of standard tillage.
At Red Rock Ranch, the Five Points farm of Diener, the group along with John's son, Justin, talked about water issues that California is facing as well as efforts the Dieners are making to address water shortages. They also learned what goes into the large organic tomato fields that they visited and learned about the minimum pass tillage practices that they use.
At Pinnacle Organically-Grown Produce, the Hollister, CA farm of Foster, the visitors saw a variety of Phil's innovations including his on-farm compost production techniques, his use of strip-tillage, and his development of the use of single-line cover crops that economize greatly on seed and water.
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No-till and strip-till dairy silage production - one of the few annual cropping sectors in CA that addresses the important soil health principle of preserving residues
September 12, 2010
Dairy silage fields under no-till and strip-till are some of the only annual cropping systems in California that address the important soil health principle of generating and preserving surface residues. While most annual crop fields are without residues due to intensive tillage practices that essentially make them disappear completely, no-till and strip-till silage farmers are achieving this key soil care practice that is otherwise ignored in most fields in the state.
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