Posts Tagged: Pest Management
UC Davis Entomology and Nematology Retiring Faculty Amass 247 Years of Service
247 years! The seven faculty members honored at the UC Davis Department of Entomology and...
UC Davis distinguished professor James R. Carey, 44 years of service (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
UC Davis distinguished professor Richard "Rick" Karban, 42 years of service
UC Davis distinguished professor emerita Lynn Kimsey, 35 years of service. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
Robert Kimsey, adjunct professor, 35 years of service (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
UC Davis distinguished professor Jay Rosenheim, 34 years of service. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
UC Davis distinguished professor Diane Ullman, 29 years of service. (Photo by Jael Mackendorf)
Professor emerita Sharon Lawler, 28 years of service. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey at UC Davis Picnic Day)
July Pest Prevention Tips
Follow these tips for the month of July to prevent pests in the garden and landscape. To see more...
Diagnosing herbicide problems takes detective work
Field day offers examples, tips for solving the mystery
A grower applies an herbicide to his tomato plants, or thinks a neighbor's treatment is drifting over her almond trees. A short time later, the leaves start to bleach or shrivel. Was it the herbicide? Or maybe water stress? Soil nutrients? Perhaps an insect?
Figuring out the causes of crop problems takes detective work, and like solving any mystery, it starts with knowing the signs, gathering evidence and asking questions.
The Diagnosing Herbicide Symptoms field day at UC Davis was an opportunity to see, up close, the shriveled cotton, scorched corn and dying sunflowers that can result when herbicides are applied incorrectly. Using the right herbicide – in the right proportion, at the right time and in the right field – can make the difference between a thriving crop and a financial loss.
A top take-away to avoid problems: “Don't do stuff at night!” laughed Becky Wheeler-Dykes, a UC Cooperative Extension farm advisor attending the June 26 event to better serve growers in Glenn, Tehama and Colusa counties. “The packages look the same. People grab the wrong jug.” And then, disaster.
Instructors were Brad Hanson, professor of Cooperative Extension; and Kassim Al-Khatib, the Melvin D. Androus endowed professor for weed science; both in the Department of Plant Sciences. They were joined by John Roncoroni, a Cooperative Extension emeritus farm advisor rooted in the department's weed science program. Attendees were a mixture of people from agriculture, industry, government officials, university researchers and Cooperative Extension advisors. The event was hosted by the Weed Research and Information Center, based in the Department of Plant Sciences.
Out in a field west of campus, visitors could see the progression of damage, from control plots with green and healthy crops to plants that looked sadder as herbicide concentrations increased. Visitors could see the patterns of damage for common foliar chemicals such as glyphosate, paraquat, and 2,4-D, as well as soil-applied herbicides from several chemical classes.
“There's a lot of detective work,” said Stephen Chang, a master's student in Hanson's lab aiming for a career in Cooperative Extension. “For example, the company that makes the herbicide says there shouldn't be a problem, but the grower says, there is a problem. This course helps with developing the skills to figure out what happened.”
It might not be the herbicide at all
Detective work and problem-solving frame the approach, Hanson explained. The cause of crop damage can be simple or complex. Like a good mystery, what appears to be a clue can turn out to be a red herring. Professionals need to draw on their inner Sherlock Holmes to observe and document symptoms, look for patterns in the plants and in the field, ask questions, gather information about the larger environment and collect samples.
An herbicidal Agatha Christie would then suggest: What if it's not herbicide damage at all? Participants learned to consider the possibility of insects, pathogens and viruses, as well as problems with water, nutrients, soil condition and even root damage from cultivation practices.
Hanson recalled puzzling over symptoms he found in an orchard. The culprit? “A leaking natural gas line,” he said.
More resources for herbicide issues
Participants also heard from Molly Mathews, deputy agriculture commissioner from Yolo County, on how a field investigation is conducted. Lawyer Robert Davies, of Donahue Davies LLP in Folsom, outlined the basics of what happens when there are lawsuits related to crop damage from herbicide drift.
The Diagnosing Herbicide Symptoms field day is part of a larger program of education and outreach offered through the Weed RIC, said director Julia Stover-Blackburn. It was the first time the event has been offered since the COVID-19 pandemic, she added.
- For more information about field days and resources, visit the Weed RIC webpage.
- For a thorough discussion of herbicide symptoms, visit this page overseen by Al-Khatib and sponsored by University of California Agriculture and Natural Resources.
- This online course follows an earlier version of the Diagnosing Herbicide Symptoms field program.
This story was originally published on the UC Davis Department of Plant Sciences website.
/h3>/h3>/h3>Don’t Move Firewood!
What you do with firewood this upcoming 4th of July (and year-round!) can impact more than just...
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.
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