UCCE Ventura County- Blogs
A Wonderful Teacher Passes
There are all kinds of expressions: “We stand on the shoulders who have come before us.” “No One is an Island.” “We learn from those around us.”
I made that last one up, but it really is true. And it's true in Cooperative Extension. We learn from the people we work with, in order to better help them and the community. Dorcas Thille was one of those people who was a great teacher and community builder who has recently passed. I thought if would be fitting to share a few of my experiences with her.
Dorcas Hardison Kimball Thille
November 3, 1931 – September 4, 2024
Was a friend of mine. She was also a mentor and guide to the workings of Ventura agriculture and the people here. She contacted me the first week I was in my position as a farm advisor and made sure I was invited to the next Calavo and Saticoy Lemon Assocation board meetings.
She was a mover and shaker. I once saw her at her home orchard and after leaving saw her at the Saticoy post office. I asked her how she had gotten there so fast, because it was only 15 minutes since we'd last seen each other. She said her BMW was fast, the fastest tractor in the area.
I always found her to be considerate and thoughtful. There was once a Hollywood company wanting to do a history of avocados in Ventura County. They had asked me to talk on avocado biology in the field and Dorcas to give a little family history at the same time. It took several takes to get it right. It was a hot, late August morning and the sun started to get to me. I started sweating, and Dorcas rose to the occasion and brought out her handkerchief so I could wipe my forehead. She was cool as a cucumber.
I worked with her on the UC Hansen Trust Board and always appreciated her defense of the local needs of the agricultural community, but also the needs of the larger community of citizens in the county. Karen Ross, Secretary of the CA Department of Food and Agriculture, said Dorcas had the needs of all of California in mind.
Dorcas shared: “We make the community we want to live in.”
dorcas
Irrigation Workshop Ventura Oct 16
Avocado Irrigation Workshop
October 16 (Wednesday), 2024
2:00 – 5:00 P.M.
UC Cooperative Extension Ventura County (California Room)
669 County Square Dr, Ventura, CA 93003
Workshop registration link: Registration
2:00 - 5:00 p.m. |
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Break: 10 mins. |
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3:45 |
Using Soil Moisture Sensor to Optimize Irrigation – Andre Biscaro, UCCE Irrigation and Water Resources Advisor, Ventura County |
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4:15 |
Water Distribution Uniformity Management in Orchards – Jamie Whiteford, Ventura County Resource Conservation District |
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4:45 |
Mission Produce TM: Resources and Updates - Danny Klittich, Mission Produce |
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5:00 |
ADJOURN |
For more information about the workshop, please contact
Ali Montazar, amontazar@ucanr.edu, or Ben Faber, bafaber@ucanr.edu.
CEU CREDITS: CCA (2.5 hrs.)
VCAILG (2.5 hrs.)
Image: Evapotranspiration monitoring station
/span>Bee Hotels and Bee Gardens - the Difference
Bee Hotels and Gardens – Applications and Limitations
The model of a ‘Bee Hotel' has been a useful tool for surveying insects in research studies for decades. However, in recent years, the concept of a bee hotel has entered the mainstream; capturing the attention of naturalists, gardeners, and those alike. With this transition, it has gained its name and evolved to take on various forms that hardly resemble the humble wooden box model used in research.
Increased interest in creating spaces for bees is hopeful, as it signifies a positive trend in attention to pollinator livelihood. The UC Berkeley Urban Bee Lab has had great success with simplistic wooden box models of bee hotels in our Costa Rica Bee Project. We share here some of the knowledge we have gained through numerous years of research working with bee hotels in both Costa Rica and California. Additionally, we offer some considerations to ponder when creating your own bee hotel, acknowledging the limitations that they hold, especially in regards to a changing climate.
Read the full story at: http://www.helpabee.org/lab-news/bee-hotels-considerations-and-limitations
A Bee Hotel
A Bee Garden in an Avocado Orchard
Learning from the Rain
Rain is wonderful stuff. If it comes and washes the accumulated salts of the last several years out of the root zones of citrus and avocado, that's a good thing. But what happens if there is a little too much rain? In the winter of 2005, Ventura got over 40” of rain, which is 100% more of what is normal. The last time big rains occurred prior to that was in the winter of 1997-98. That year the rains were evenly spaced on almost a weekly basis through the winter and into the late spring and over 50" fell. That year we had major problems with both citrus and avocados collapsing from asphyxiation. The same occurred in 2005, but not so pronounced.
Most rainfall years are not average, usually it is more or less than average. And sometimes the rains come, and flooding happens throughout California. The winter of 1861/62 saw such flooding that the harbor at Goleta was filled in.
In 2023, we had a lot more rain than we normally see and in Carpinteria it rained 4 inches in July!!!!!! And with the rain we saw mudslides and buried orchards, and with wet soil and winds we saw avocado trees being blown over.
And then came the winter of 2023/24, and there was more rain and more devastation (mudslides, buried orchards, etc.). But in general, trees look good. The consequences of low rainfall and the resulting greater application of salty irrigation water is leaf burn and often Botryosphaerias. After two wet rainy winters, we see much less of this kind of damage.
But there's been more subtle damage going on, especially avocados. It's been particularly hard on young trees with poorly developed root systems and orchards on flat ground. Asphyxiation has happened with the soils being too wet. Excluding air reduces root function, especially in the uptake of iron. It also allows ethylene to accumulate. Ethylene is a plant growth regulator that accelerates maturity. When roots sense ethylene, it causes leaf and fruit drop. The combined lack of oxygen and accumulation of ethylene leads to iron chlorosis and leaf drop. These are characteristic symptoms of asphyxiation and wet soils.
What other problems have we seen with rain, and what can be done to prepare for the unexpected? Learning from the Rain
https://ceventura.ucanr.edu/newsletters/Topics_in_Subtropics102527.pdf
rain
Soil Moisture Sensor Selection
Soil moisture sensor selection. An extensive range of soil moisture sensors/probes have already been commercialized and are available to use in avocado and other orchards. They determine the real-time soil water potential (tension) or volumetric water content and are dominated by a small number of technologies including granular matrix or gypsum block sensors, tensiometers, time domain reflectometry (TDR) sensors, and Frequency Domain Reflectometry (FDR) or capacitance sensors (Table 1 and Fig. 2). Some commonly used soil moisture sensors can be combined with various telemetry devices to access the data through cloud-based data storage applications. Data is automatically uploaded by radio or cell phone communications to cloud-based computer servers and is accessible through apps on smartphones and tablets. These communication advancements greatly improve the convenience of accessing data and can be configured to provide timely alerts when trees require irrigation.
Read more about their use in avocado and other orchard tree cropsl, as well as other tasty topics at:
https://ceventura.ucanr.edu/newsletters/Topics_in_Subtropics102527.pdf
soil moisture senors