Posts Tagged: food

UC food-safety specialist tests biosensors to ensure safe produce

 

Ahmed El-Moghazy joined UC Agriculture and Natural Resources as a UC Cooperative Extension food safety specialist in February and is based at UC Riverside. Food safety, according to El-Moghazy, are measures that ensure food is free from harmful contaminants, prevent foodborne illnesses and is safe to eat. El-Moghazy is responsible for assisting California farmers and food processing facilities to enhance food safety practices by training appropriate personnel and addressing food-safety issues on their farms.

As the principal investigator for the 2-SAFE Lab at UC Riverside, El-Moghazy is investigating the accuracy and applicability of point-of-use biosensor technology. The small, lightweight and easy-to-use sensor can be used while out in the field or in a packing house to test contamination of liquids such as irrigation and washing water or solids like food samples.

Testing for foodborne pathogens traditionally takes two to three days and the process can be costly. The biosensor technology that El-Moghazy is using is inexpensive and can provide results within one work shift, which allows businesses that grow fresh produce to confirm the safety of their products before sending them to the market.

The alternative, selling contaminated food to consumers, is not only detrimental to human health, but can ruin the reputation of businesses, making way for unanticipated costs associated with recalling contaminated products and regulatory consequences including fines and sanctions. 

El-Moghazy is also developing the next generation of antimicrobial surface coatings and materials that can rapidly control the foodborne pathogens and hinder the transfer of harmful bacteria from contaminated food to non-contaminated food.

El-Moghazy is optimistic that his research can safeguard public health, reduce the burden of foodborne illness and protect the integrity of businesses. Although El-Moghazy serves the entire state, he is dedicating a large part of his needs assessment and efforts in Southern California where high-value specialty crops such as avocados and citrus are grown.

"Did you know that one in every six Americans get sick from eating food contaminated with a foodborne pathogen?" asked El-Moghazy. Understanding the fatality of foodborne illnesses, El-Moghazy believes that increasing awareness through education is an essential aspect of his role. "It's true, but not many people realize this, or that 40% of foodborne illnesses stem from fresh produce."

To protect consumers, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration requires farms with a certain level of annual sales (adjusted for inflation) of fruits and vegetables typically consumed raw to have one employee who has completed an FDA-approved Produce Safety Rule Grower Training.

In addition to certified trainings, El-Moghazy offers technical assistance to ensure growers comply before and after inspections, as well as resources for several topics including produce safety, agriculture water, flooding, soil amendments, worker health, hygiene and training and postharvest handling and sanitation. He can also assist in developing food-safety plans and other general farm food-safety protocols. His technical expertise covers all aspects of food production and supply including irrigation water quality, hygiene of harvesting tools and transportation.

Before joining ANR, El-Moghazy completed two years as a visiting scholar in the UC Davis Biological and Agricultural Engineering department before continuing as a postdoctoral fellow in the UC Davis Food Science and Technology department for 5 years. Much of his work was rooted in the development of biosensors and antimicrobial materials for food safety. While in Davis, he collaborated with local farms and food processing companies on food safety research and extension.

El-Moghazy earned a Ph.D. studying developmental biosensors for food safety applications to detect pesticides residues from a joint program offered by University of Perpignan in France and Alexandria University in Egypt. He also earned a master's degree in developmental biobased fungicides and a bachelor's in agriculture science from Alexandria University. Finally, he completed a fellowship at the Institute of Plant Protection, Szent Istvan University in Hungary, where he studied how to extend shelf-life of fresh produce using biomaterials.

El-Moghazy is based at UC Riverside in the Department of Microbiology and Plant Pathology. He can be reached at aelmogha@ucr.edu or  (951) 827-0257.

Report outlines top concerns in California organic agriculture

Organic Agriculture Institute needs assessment refines how it can address pressing challenges

The explosive growth of organic agriculture in the U.S. – reflected in a 90% increase in organic farms from 2011 to 2021, according to U.S. Department of Agriculture statistics – has come at a cost for some farmers. With new farming operations increasing the supply of organic commodities, along with consolidation of buyers, growers report that their profit margins are not what they used to be.

Those market size considerations are among the challenges highlighted in a new report detailing the initial findings by the University of California Organic Agriculture Institute on the most pressing needs of the state's organic sector. OAI gathered and analyzed data from 423 responses to an online grower survey, over 60 interviews with stakeholders across the organic community, and additional observations from farm visits and workshops.

The report describes other frequently mentioned systemic priorities, such as maintaining integrity of the term “organic,” developing a market for organic seeds, spreading consumer awareness, and alleviating the burdens of organic certification and reporting.

Shriya Rangarajan, the postdoctoral researcher with OAI leading this statewide needs assessment, said that the reported challenges varied by organic status (fully certified, transitioning to organic, or a mixed farm with some conventional), type of crop, as well as size of the operation. She noted survey respondents were roughly representative of the sector overall – 70% small-scale growers and 30% medium and large.

“Organic is not a homogenous industry, to say the least – small growers and large growers are very different; for small growers, their challenges tend to be financial and regulatory, especially relating to certification requirements and labor,” said Rangarajan. She added that larger growers mentioned different types of challenges, weeds and pest pressures for instance, given the difficulty in controlling managing these at scale without the use or availability of organic inputs.

Organic Agriculture Institute key to sharing resources across state

Another common theme from the assessment is that the organic sector needs more accessible resources to address those myriad concerns. For OAI, established in 2020 under UC Agriculture and Natural Resources, the initial findings validated and refined the direction of its research and extension programs.

“As a new organization, we've been trying to figure out where we fit into this ecosystem and how we can support it,” said Houston Wilson, a UC Cooperative Extension entomology specialist who has served as OAI's director since its founding.

Because OAI was envisioned as a hub of resources and connections for California's organic community, Wilson and his colleagues are especially interested in understanding how its constituent members obtain information – and how OAI can improve their access.

“Growers are finding it difficult to navigate the resources that exist for organic agriculture, like technical information, financial support, compliance and certification support,” Wilson said. "While we'd like to see more resources for organic in general, those that currently exist can sometimes be hard to navigate or it can be hard to know where to go for the right thing – that became really apparent early on.”

While some producers are contacting OAI directly with their questions, Wilson is eager to develop tools and systems that can serve the community more broadly. For example, Wilson and Krista Marshall – OAI's policy and partnerships coordinator – are currently beta-testing a new map tool, built in conjunction with UC ANR's Informatics and GIS (IGIS) team. The map, expected to be ready in fall 2024, will enable users to click on their county and see all available resources related to organic agriculture.

Wilson added that OAI will have four full-time staffers by fall, further expanding its research, extension, and education efforts. After holding four field events this past year, OAI aims to increase activities in the coming year, including not just field events but also online resources, webinars and more. Also, a new training and technical assistance coordinator will be tasked with bringing Cooperative Extension advisors and other technical assistance personnel across the state up to speed on a range of organic topics, so they can more effectively answer questions from clientele in their region.

New survey aims to trace crucial organic knowledge networks

Although the OAI team has gained a sense of how information is shared across the organic community (and started to formalize those interconnections through a California Organic Agriculture Knowledge Network), they are now developing a survey to study those relationships more systematically.

“We're trying to understand what kind of knowledge resources people tap into, which is something that has come up repeatedly in our needs assessment,” Rangarajan said. “We're trying to understand who people are speaking to because, at the end of the day, organic is still a relatively small part of agriculture in California, and that makes it more fragmented. So trying to connect those different parts becomes important.”

Once Wilson has a more nuanced understanding of organic knowledge networks, he will be able to strategize and position OAI – and the UC – as a more effective partner and contributor in the sector.

“Given the history of organic, growers have had to rely on each other a lot,” Wilson explained. “We understand that the university has unique expertise to bring to the table, but we also acknowledge that there's all these other knowledge holders out there, so one of the roles that we see ourselves having is helping to facilitate those connections, strengthen them and increase the frequency of interaction.”

That may include further supporting efforts that connect transitioning organic farmers with experienced growers (a mentorship program led by Certified California Organic Farmers, or CCOF), or giving more structure to grower-researcher partnerships that can help address a host of production challenges. In OAI's grower survey, weed management topped the list, followed by water and disease issues, all exacerbated by climate variability.

“I think a lot of the real innovation changes are coming through growers experimenting with their own practice,” Rangarajan explained. “From a research perspective, one of the best ways to take this forward would be to formalize those experiments in some way so that knowledge becomes more reportable.”

And collaboration on “organic topics,” such as finding alternatives to synthetic pesticides, are a boon to the entire agricultural sector – conventional growers included.

“Everyone is trying to reduce pesticide use; everyone is trying to reduce environmental impacts,” Wilson said. “You don't have to be certified organic to benefit from organic research; these practices can be used by anyone.”

The report with OAI's initial findings on organic needs can be found at: https://ucanr.edu/sites/organic/files/396228.pdf.

Postharvest Center: New research focus and outreach

Still providing the world with top-notch information

UC Davis has been a leading source of information for people handling, packaging and transporting crops since the beginnings of the Postharvest Research and Extension Center in 1979. Now, the center is strengthening its focus on the needs of industry, offering fresh courses, weaving strategic partnerships and expanding into digital media, all while building up its research capacity to better serve the needs of the produce industry.

“We're asking people in the industry, ‘How can we support you? How can we better listen to you?' We want people to know we're not disconnected know-it-alls,” said new center co-director Bárbara Blanco-Ulate, an associate professor in the UC Davis Department of Plant Sciences. “We're getting more faculty involvement, people with expertise in related fields such as quality engineering and safety, as well as bringing in emeriti faculty and people from around California. We're forming partnerships with organizations around the world, and we've opened up to people from other institutions around the country.”

“The larger the network, the more things we can do,” added fellow co-director Irwin R. Donis-Gonzalez, an associate professor of UC Cooperative Extension in the Department of Biological and Agricultural Engineering.

The foundation: Expanded research

The new co-directors will beef up the center's applied science component with the hiring of a research specialist. They aim to provide new information that can be used industry-wide as companies explore new ways to handle and store fresh produce.

“We're building the capacity to respond to industry requests for research,” Blanco-Ulate said.

New courses, national reach

Their first workshop, held recently, demonstrates the center's renewed vision and commitment to broad networking: The Agricultural Water Systems Workshop addressed current concerns around water management and risks to food safety. Partners in the course included the Western Growers Association, the University of Arizona, the University of Florida and Salinas-based Taylor Fresh Foods, Inc.

Courses given over the past several years that have been recorded will be posted to the center's new, online video library and to the center's YouTube channel.

“People can watch those courses for free,” Blanco-Ulate said. In addition, new courses will be offered in-person and hybrid.

The co-directors are working with the University of California to offer continuing and professional education credits to course participants.

Online resources – many for free!

The center's website features a database with scores of free product fact sheets, which are downloaded by users around the world. The fact sheets are so highly regarded that they are considered expert evidence in legal proceedings, Blanco-Ulate said. Visitors to the website can also find links to research papers published by UC Davis faculty, including seminal works by Adel Kader, who founded the center.

Books are offered through the center's online bookstore and include titles through UC Agriculture and Natural Resources. Ten new titles are being planned, including topic-specific updates taken from previous classics.

Debunking myths: Ethylene

A new newsletter deals with a new problem: Misinformation about food and food handling that spreads through social media. One example is the use of ethylene to ripen produce such as bananas, so that they can be safely stored until ready for the consumer.

“Ethylene is safe for humans and does not leave any harmful residue on produce,” Donis-Gonzalez wrote in the center's latest newsletter. Even better news, he added: The levels of ethylene used on food are a tiny fraction of the concentrations that would be needed to create an explosion, one of the false alarms being raised in social media.

Evolving with the times

After 47 years of service, these and more updates will keep the center at the forefront of an evolving postharvest world. The top goal: Meet the needs of agriculturalists, industry and consumers.

“We are adapting to new needs, with both the resources and the workshop we're offering,” Donis-Gonzalez said.

“As a land-grant institution, we take our outreach mission seriously,” Blanco-Ulate added.

Related links

More about the UC Davis Postharvest Research and Extension Center.

This story first appeared on the UC Davis Department of Plant Sciences site.

West Side REC study: A cradle of California regenerative agriculture

In 20-year study, UCCE specialist Mitchell, colleagues, growers advance no-till and cover cropping practices

In the 1990s, long before “regenerative agriculture” was a buzzword and “soil health” became a cause célèbre, a young graduate student named Jeff Mitchell first learned about similar concepts during an agronomy meeting in the Deep South.

Mitchell was astonished to hear a long list of benefits attributed to practices known internationally as “conservation agriculture” – eliminating or reducing tillage, cover cropping and preserving surface residues (the plant debris left after harvest). Potential positive impacts include decreasing dust in the air, saving farmers money on fuel and equipment maintenance, improving soil vitality and water dynamics and a host of other ecosystem services.

“All of these things start adding up and you kind of scratch your head and say, ‘Well, maybe we ought to try some of this,'” recalled Mitchell, who became a University of California Cooperative Extension cropping systems specialist at UC Davis in 1994.

In 1998, Mitchell launched a long-term study of those practices at the West Side Research and Extension Center (REC) in Five Points, Fresno County. “We started this because, way back when I first began my job, nobody was doing this,” he explained. “This was brand-new, uncharted territory for California.”

For the next 20 years, Mitchell and his colleagues studied changes to the soil and ecosystem, learned from their failures and successes, and shared those hard-won lessons with fellow scientists and farmers across the state. A summary of their findings was recently published in the journal California Agriculture.

Conservation agriculture in California: ‘No trivial undertaking'

Mitchell and the Conservation Agriculture Systems Innovation Workgroup – a network established in 1998 comprising farmers, researchers, public agency personnel and members of private entities and environmental groups – started with a virtually blank slate. According to Mitchell, surveys at the beginning of the 21st century found that conservation agriculture practices were used on less than one-half of 1% of annual crop acreage in California.

Although no-till is common in the Midwest and Southeast of the U.S. and across wide swaths of the globe, it was almost unheard of in the Golden State. With the development of irrigation infrastructure in the 1920s, California farmers saw continually phenomenal growth in yield over the last century – and thus had little incentive to deviate from tried-and-true methods that relied on regular tillage.

Nevertheless, intrigued by the potential benefits of conservation agriculture, Mitchell wanted to see which of those practices could be feasibly applied to California cropping systems. During the 20-year study at West Side REC, the researchers grew a rotation of cotton-tomato, followed by a rotation of garbanzo, melons, and sorghum, and finally tomatoes.

But at first, it was a struggle to grow anything at all – as they had to master the basics of how to establish the plants in a no-till, high-residue system.

“This was no trivial undertaking,” Mitchell said. “Early on we struggled – we failed the first couple of years because we didn't know the planting techniques and we had to learn those. There was an upfront, very steep learning curve that we had to manage and overcome.”

Then there was the long wait to see any measurable improvements to soil health indicators, such as the amount carbon in the soil.

“For the first eight years, we didn't see any changes whatsoever,” Mitchell said. “But then they became strikingly different, between the no-till cover crop system and the conventional field without cover crops, and the divergence between those two systems became even starker.”

The two-decade time horizon for the West Side REC study is one major reason why it has been so valuable for growers and scientists alike.

“It's so hard to capture measurable changes in soil health and soil function metrics through research because those changes are really slow,” said Sarah Light, UCCE agronomy farm advisor for Sutter, Yuba and Colusa counties and a co-author of the recent California Agriculture paper. “Often in the course of a three-year grant you don't actually get statistically significant differences.”

Reaching, teaching and learning from farmers

The study site on the west side of the San Joaquin Valley also has been a vital teaching resource. Even though Light works with farmers in the Sacramento Valley, she has conveyed findings from that research with her clientele and uses soil samples from the site to vividly illustrate a significant benefit of conservation agriculture practices.

In one demonstration, she drops soil aggregates – which look like clumps of soil – into two containers of water. One clump, from heavily tilled land, falls apart quickly and the water becomes dark and murky. The other, comprised of soil that has been no-till and cover cropped for 20 years, holds together – a sign of healthy, resilient soil – and the water remains relatively clear.

“It's a really simple demo, but it's very effective because it shows how easily soil aggregates break apart with water – or not,” Light said.

That aggregate stability is a key factor in soil's ability to both move water (infiltration) and hold onto water (retention). Those dynamics are crucial for farmers to avoid ponding in their fields, preserve water for drier months, and generally endure the flood/drought whiplash of climate change.

Over the years, Mitchell has hosted thousands of visitors at the West Side REC study site to showcase the potential benefits of adopting soil-health management practices.

“I don't think I'm exaggerating in saying that this is probably the most-visited agricultural field station project in the history of UC ANR (UC Agriculture and Natural Resources),” he said.

Both the West Side REC – and Mitchell himself – are greatly valued by the local grower community.

“Jeff is a microcosm of the university's applied research on the West Side of the San Joaquin Valley,” said John Diener, who grows almonds, fresh market garlic, canning tomatoes, cotton, masa corn and wheat for production and seed on land adjacent to the field station.

Growers adopt, adapt and adjust practices

Tom Willey, a retired farmer and longtime collaborator with Mitchell, has actively encouraged peers to visit the Five Points site – especially in the early years.

“It was very innovative and there weren't many examples of that anywhere in the state,” Willey said. “So, I helped encourage people to go out there and learn and possibly think about doing similar work on their own farms.”

Willey himself was a pioneer in experimenting with no-till practices in organic vegetable cropping systems.

“As organic farmers, we were probably more tillage dependent than conventional farmers because it was the only method we had for weed control; we weren't able to use herbicides,” Willey said.

Despite early struggles, he persisted in trying different techniques and mechanical means of weeding. And Willey later partnered with a group of progressive vegetable growers and UC and California State University Chico personnel to secure a Conservation Innovation Grant from the Natural Resources Conservation Service to support more on-farm trials and share their experiences.

In the end, however, no-till proved too risky to continue, given the losses they incurred. One tricky issue is nutrient cycling. The organic growers found that after mowing down a cover crop and spreading compost, leaving those nutrients on the surface without incorporating into the soil through more vigorous tilling (or adding synthetic fertilizers, as conventional growers could do) results in lower yields. In the short term, farmers simply did not see yields that could sustain their operation.

“It's very difficult in vegetable systems, and particularly difficult in organic vegetable systems,” Willey said. “I would say a number of us have learned to diminish the over-reliance that we had on tillage, but not to completely eliminate it.”

Cover cropping is also a challenge for some farmers, with certain cover crops making a perfect haven for devastating pests such as lygus bugs and stink bugs, according to Diener.

“We do everything we can to eliminate the host crop from which they come, so why am I going to bring the enemies to my house?” he said. “It's about making enough money to be there next year. You're not going to be there next year with these pests. It's just not a practical management option, in light of our significant pest pressure and disease hosts for our crops of value.”

Instead of planting cover crops, Diener said he opts for mixing in grain crops that can similarly contribute to soil health – while generating revenue at the same time. According to Diener, a longtime collaborator with Mitchell, the best way to adopt conservation agriculture practices is to tailor them to specific localities and each grower's circumstances. And in his corner of the San Joaquin Valley, that means not following the template of the high-precipitation, no-till systems found in the Midwest.

“We've adapted Jeff's principles to our program; it won't look like Iowa to you, which is what everybody comes to expect to see. It ain't how it works, folks,” Diener said. “It's a different methodology. We do those things that fit our environment and that's why that West Side field station is important – because it's our environment.”

Promoting and enhancing soil health, one step at a time

More widespread adoption of soil-health management practices can be driven by a variety of factors. With the rise of drip irrigation in tomatoes, for example, more growers began using no-till or reduced till to minimize disruptions to the delicate driptape in their fields.

And, according to Mitchell, the dramatic increase in no-till practices in dairy silage production – from less than 1% to over 40% – was the result of entrepreneurial efforts by a small but extraordinarily dedicated group from the private sector that worked with farmers, one by one.

Because optimizing these practices requires close and intensive attention – and no small amount of courage and gumption – Mitchell and Light understand that growers might need to take an incremental approach. Even one fewer pass over the field, or cover cropping every other year, can provide some benefit for soil health, Light said.

“The value is that when you can prove the concept, then you can motivate every step of the way,” Light explained. “Jeff is showing the shining light of the goalposts, and that can motivate us to take every challenging step along the way.”

Shannon Cappellazzi, who helped with the data analysis on the recently published California Agriculture paper, agrees that there is value in taking a stepwise approach in building soil health.

Cappellazzi was the lead project scientist on the Soil Health Institute's North American Project to Evaluate Soil Health Measurements, which looked at 124 different long-term soil research sites across the continent – including the Five Points site.

After analyzing 2,000 samples from the various study sites, Cappellazzi said the evidence suggests that layering on each component of a conservation agriculture program – doing no-till, adding cover crops and then integrating livestock, for example – can have additive, cumulative benefits for soil health.

“I think having the data to show the long-term benefit makes people willing to do the short-term change, even if it's a little bit hard for a couple years,” Cappellazzi said.

The research at the West Side REC also produced another key takeaway.

“To me, what really stood out was that for most of the soil health indicators, cover crops had a huge impact. Both the cover crops that had no till – and the cover crops that had standard tillage – had considerably higher carbon and soil health indicator measurements than those without cover crops,” said Cappellazzi. She added that the data also indicated improvements in how the water moved into the soil, and how the soil held that water.

Vital research drives an enduring legacy

Water management and conservation, of course, will be paramount in California's increasingly volatile climate reality. Mitchell's Five Points research – and related studies across the San Joaquin Valley by UC Davis agroecologist Amélie Gaudin and others – contributed data that overturned a long-held belief about winter cover cropping.

“There's a lot of preconceived ideas about cover crop water use,” Mitchell said. “One of the things that we learned was that compared to bare soil water loss in the wintertime, cover crop water loss during that same growing period – from about November through March – tends to be almost a wash.”

That crucial finding provided researchers and soil health advocates with invaluable evidence to preserve the practice as an option for farmers.

“They've needed to go around and give a dog-and-pony show to a lot of Groundwater Sustainability Agencies (GSA) that had been on the brink of banning the growing of cover crops because the perception out there is that they use a lot of water,” said Willey, the retired vegetable grower. “But over the winter months, cover crops don't use a lot of water. In fact, they may not use any net water at all.”

The young researchers who studied cover-crop water use represent another important legacy of the Five Points study site. It has been an experiential training ground for many of the next generation of soil scientists, agronomists and ecologists.

“The number of students who have been trained by and through this study has been really phenomenal,” said Mitchell, noting that they have worked on topics ranging from air quality to soil carbon related to no-till and cover cropping.

Their contributions will be essential in continuing to refine and optimize these practices that are fundamental to conservation agriculture. On Diener's concerns about lygus bugs and stink bugs, for example, Cappellazzi – in her new role as director of research at GO Seed – is studying and breeding cover crops with an eye on characteristics that make for less hospitable habitats for certain pests.

Indeed, while the California Agriculture paper effectively wraps up the 20-year study at Five Points, its lessons will continue to resonate and inspire for years to come.

“This is a step in a long journey,” Light said. “It's a launchpad – this paper might be able to tie a bow on it in terms of the data collection, but in terms of the extension impact, this is really just the beginning.”

And for Willey, the omnipresent climate crisis compels the entire sector to pick up the pace along that journey.

“We've got a lot of pressure now to evolve agriculture very rapidly in response to climate change and I don't think we can sit around and twiddle our thumbs,” he said. “We know the directions we need to be heading – with more natural systems mimicry and less reliance on toxic inputs and synthetic fertilizers – and we need to figure out how to incentivize and support farmers in moving in those directions.”

4-H, Boys and Girls Club, UCCE partner to inspire Orange County kids

Small containers with varying levels of sugar sit next to a row of beverages, including water, fruit juices, soda, a sports drink and chocolate milk. Trying to match each container with the beverage that contains its corresponding amount of sugar, Amore, a fourth grader, reads the nutrition label on the orange juice bottle. “What does the bottle say?” asked a student in the audience, attempting to help Amore.

Life skills such as how to read a nutrition label are representative of learning that youth can expect when joining 4-H, a nationwide program focused on empowering kids ages 5 to 18. 4-H offers experiential learning opportunities ranging from STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics) and healthy living to civic engagement and leadership.

To expand its reach and make their program more accessible, 4-H launched a digital learning platform called CLOVER by 4-H that offers content tailored for three types of users: learner, parent and educator. As the platform grows in popularity, 4-H is eager to identify best practices in engaging new users to join the platform and retain their interest.

More than 250 free 4-H lessons

In California, 4-H programs are overseen by University of California Agriculture and Natural Resources. Given its successful contributions to statewide initiatives in the past, 4-H in Orange County, administered through the local UC Cooperative Extension office, was one of three counties selected to participate in a CLOVER pilot project in conjunction with the National 4-H Council. With more than 250 4-H lessons available online at no cost, the pilot project aims to introduce its users to 4-H.

To generate interest, 4-H in Orange County is leveraging connections to local Boys and Girls Clubs. In March, they hosted more than 20 kids from the Boys and Girls Club of Garden Grove (BGCGG) – including Amore – for a day of learning and exploration at the UC South Coast Research and Extension Center in Irvine, where the 4-H program for Orange County is based.

Rita Jakel, community education specialist and program coordinator for 4-H of Orange County, said that partnering with BGCGG will, hopefully, inspire its members to join their local 4-H club.

“The youth created a CLOVER account before engaging in eight CLOVER lessons taught by the staff at the Boys and Girls Club during their weeklong Spring Break Day Camp,” said Jakel, noting that the participants were introduced to 4-H before arriving to South Coast REC for in-person activities.

Interactive nutrition and gardening lessons

During their visit, the participants engaged in a typical day of 4-H lessons featuring presentations from the local Expanded Food and Nutrition Education Program (EFNEP) and UC Master Gardener volunteers. Jakel then wrapped up with interactive sessions on animal adaptations—understanding the challenges animals face in gathering food—as well as lessons on growing and cooking with herbs.

“One of the most rewarding aspects of working with young people is the opportunity to creatively educate them on various subjects, ensuring that learning is both enjoyable and engaging,” said Javier Miramontes, community nutrition and health supervisor for EFNEP in Orange and Los Angeles counties, who started the day off with the lesson on nutrition labels. 

Miramontes visually explained how much sugar is found in various beverages and then challenged the students to do so on their own. “It's important to me that all students participate, as engagement is key at their age, not only for inclusivity but also to maintain their focus,” he said. Miramontes concluded with a review of his lesson and was pleased that most of the class demonstrated a solid understanding of the key topics.

While the intention of CLOVER is to introduce users to 4-H in hopes that they would want to become members of their local clubs, Jakel believes that participating through CLOVER could be just as effective, if not more. “We're testing out the idea of bringing kids to our facility for typical 4-H programming. If they like it, our hope is that they'll sign up on CLOVER and gain access to our educational approach there,” said Jakel.

4-H in person and online

The goal is to give youth options so that the 4-H experience, whether in person or online, does not feel out of reach.

When discussing their collaboration, Jakel said that the BGCGG staff would continue to support interested kids and their families with CLOVER registration. The staff also agreed to conduct programming based on the digital platform at their facility to continue exposing BGCGG members to all that 4-H has to offer, which they have already reported as easy to implement and engaging among the youth.

During their time in the garden, members learned about vermiculture and how worms are essential for compost. Mary Nguyen, STEM specialist for BGCGG, said that she enjoyed watching the youth light up when they are playing in the dirt and learning about how fruits can be combined to produce new generations. To wrap up their visit to the garden, the group received a small worm box to use for their own school garden.

“I hope that more fun field trips – and hands-on activities involving research that youth can participate in – will come from our partnership with South Coast REC and 4-H,” Nguyen said.

Field trips to see, touch, smell and taste 

From a UC Master Gardener's perspective, the youth were extremely interested in learning about everything and asked many questions. “I loved their curiosity,” said UC Master Gardener volunteer Laura Holly, who helped with the garden demonstration and tour of UC South Coast Research and Extension Center. “They wanted to know why certain pipes were painted purple (to indicate reclaimed water), about the windmills and how avocado trees are grafted.”

“More children would benefit from seeing how the trees that produce the fruit they eat grow,” Holly added.

Hannah, a fourth grader, said that she loved the lesson on herbs that Jakel led before the participants boarded the bus to return home. All members got to see, touch, smell and taste four different herbs before planting their own to take home. “I had a lot of fun. I think if I had to grow one thing, it would be chives. They actually taste really good,” Hannah said.

Amore, who knew what lavender smelled like before, had never seen a lavender plant. “My mom loves lavender, but I didn't know this is what it looks like. I planted some lavender to take home for her,” she said.

The partnership with BGCGG is one of many that Jakel hopes to foster in Orange County, in addition to uniting UCCE programs to enrich the learning experience for youth who visit South Coast REC and those enrolled in the 4-H program. Her goal, in line with that of CLOVER, is to make 4-H programming more accessible for the youth, parents and educators alike.

To learn more about 4-H in Orange County, visit https://oc4h.org/.

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