Agriculture

Today was a good day on the University of California, Davis, campus.

Leeks were grown on 589 acres in Monterey County in 2018 and were worth $10.8 million. Depending on the planting date, they can be in the field for 120 or more days, particularly if they are over wintered.

Scientists are developing climate-smart farming practices, California is offering financial incentives to implement them, and now a group of 10 UC Cooperative Extension climate-smart educators are taking the program to the next level.

UC Davis distinguished professor Walter Soares Leal, a leading global scientist and inventor in the field of insect olfaction and communication, is a newly selected fellow of the National Academy of Inventors (NIA), which honors and encourages academic inventions that benefit society.

Doctoral candidate and forest entomologist Jackson Audley of the UC Davis Department of Entomology and Nematology, targets an invasive bark beetle that's about the size of a grain of rice. The beetle? The walnut twig beetle, Pityophthorus juglandis.

Scorching temperatures and parched earth are no match for the sorghum plant this cereal crop, native to Africa, will remain green and productive, even under conditions that would render other plants brown, brittle and barren.

We hope by now most people have heard about and are aware of the Asian citrus psyllid (ACP), a small brown insect that carries a deadly citrus disease called huanglongbing (HLB), threatening all backyard citrus trees as well as the statewide citrus industry.

Rome wasn't built in a day. But learning how to make mead? You can learn the process from "honey to the bottle all in one day" on Thursday, Jan. 23 at the University of California, Davis. Mead, the world's oldest alcoholic beverage, is a fermented blend of pure honey and water.

So you're seated at the Thanksgiving dinner table listening to what people are thankful for, what they treasure the most. The three "F's" win hands-down: family, friends and food. But "insects" should definitely added to that list.

Emily Bick does UC Davis proud, not to mention the field of entomology.